The Changing Face of Compute
A recap of our emerging thesis on the changing nature of compute and what that means for semis companies large and small.
Category Archives: Qualcomm
Home Depot for DIY Chips
The large, incumbent chip companies are all choosing to embrace the trend of Roll-Your-Own chips by offering support services to non-chip companies’ efforts. Done well this may end up driving those customers to buy more catalog parts. Hopefully.
A Quick Overview of AMD
AMD is a good proxy for the rest of the semis industry – beset by cyclical challenges but also increasingly well-positioned for the changing shape of the industry.
Is Apple Failing at Modems?
There are a lot of reasons why Apple’s cellular modem may be failing, most of them just come down to the fact that modems are different and hard.
Will someone else buy Arm?
There seems to be some momentum for Arm to sell itself to some sort of consortium of major licensees. In theory, this could be a good outcome, but in practice would be very complex.
Is Qualcomm Going Back into the Data Center?
We think Qualcomm is expanding its “ASIC” business, helping hyperscalers in designing their own chips.
MWC 2022 – Qualcomm Re-enters Infrastructure
At MWC Qualcomm made many announcements about wireless infrastructure – not their typical market. We think they are building a software ecosystem around their chips, to promote adoption of mmWave, and preparing the way for future products.
Vicarious MWC – The Fight Over Open RAN
MWC is once again the venue for the global persuasion campaign between competing visions of the O-RAN project. The big swing factor this time around is the growing presence of hyperscalers, notably Microsoft Azure.
Vicarious MWC – The Power of a Single Hyphen
Qualcomm has a lot of buzzwords in their X70 press release – AI ! 5G ! – but the real significance of this news can be found in a single hyphen between Modem and RF.
MWC 2022 – Living Vicariously
Qualcomm put out 16 press releases ahead of MWC – lots of intriguing things going on – especially around their new RF+AI products and the company’s renewed interest in mobile infrastructure.