A lot of the press we see on AI tends to be of the “big iron” variety – recognition algorithms for Facebook images, Google TensorFlow and IBM Watson systems. But AI is already on edge-nodes such as smartphones and home automation hubs, for functions like voice-recognition, facial recognition and natural language understanding.… Read More
Tag: snapdragon
Qualcomm’s New X16 LTE Modem Delivers Gigabit LTE And A Scalable Architecture
Qualcomm has been the global unit and revenue market share leader for years in modem technologies used in smartphones, tablets, PCs and IoT (Internet of Things). One of the reasons they have maintained this lead for so long is that they are typically first to market with new generations of modems. Today at their investor conference,… Read More
Intel And Qualcomm Partner (Yes, Really)
For the longest time, the 802.11ad space, also known as WiGig by others, was a conglomeration of different 60 GHz Wi-Fi technologies. There have been many companies that have announced technologies utilizing 60 GHz Wi-Fi technologies including Intel, Nitero, Peraso, Qualcomm, Samsung Electronics and SiBEAM. Even though many… Read More
SoCs in New Context Look beyond PPA
If we look back in the last century, performance and area were two main criteria for semiconductor chip design. All design tools and flows were concentrated towards optimizing those two aspects. As a result, density of chips started increasing and power became a critical factor. Now, Power, Performance and Area (PPA) are looked… Read More
Qualcomm Earnings Call
Qualcomm had their earnings call today. There has been a lot of discussion about their business going forward and they lowered guidance. They didn’t say explicitly why but in the usual Kabuik theater of these things this is what they did say:While our outlook for the first half of the fiscal year is ahead of our prior expectations,… Read More
Lights, audio, and waiting for action from Qualcomm
The news Qualcomm has shipped over a billion Snapdragon chips in Android smartphones broke last September. After reiterating that and a sustained outlook for smartphones over the next five years, the Qualcomm CES 2015 presser seemed to leave most media outlets a bit disappointed. Naturally, that prompts us to ask what is going… Read More
A Brief History of Qualcomm
Qualcomm is the largest fabless semiconductor company in the world. If you have a smarphone there is a good chance you have a Qualcomm chip in your pocket. It is headquartered in San Diego with offices pretty much everywhere.
Qualcomm’s roots are in Linkabit, which was founded by Irwin Jacobs and Andrew Viterbi. They, along with … Read More
Qualcomm Video Friday
Two videos (both short) from Qualcomm. They are both amusing but also have a serious aspect to them. The first one is interesting since it is Qualcomm following in Intel’s footsteps with its “Intel Inside” campaign against AMD to make people care about what processor was in their PC. Until that point probably… Read More
Battling SoCs: QCOM vs NVDA vs Samsung
If I had to describe CES in one word it would be exhausting. There were 3,000+ vendors, 150,000+ people, lines for everything, but 100% pure excitement. Even my beautiful wife was intrigued by the technology that shapes our lives. The smart toaster was of great interest to her since she says I time my toast with the smoke alarm. The … Read More
A Brief History of SoCs
Interesting to note; our cell phones today have more computing power than NASA had for the first landing on the moon. The insides of these mobile devices that we can’t live without are not like personal computers or even laptops with a traditional CPU (central processing unit) and a dozen other support chips. The brain, heart, and… Read More