As Apple seeks new chip suppliers, theories abound
The Intel scenario: Intel is pursuing future chip business at Apple aggressively, according to Piper Jaffray's Richard."Intel's weakness is its SoC [system-on-a-chip] design capability which lags the rest of the industry as much as its manufacturing leads," Richards wrote. But "Apple needs to maintain control of its microprocessor architecture and software to differentiate its products, protect its IP [intellectual property] and slow copy cats. Based on these assumptions, we think Apple and Intel could benefit by working together," he wrote. But what Intel would make is unclear.A special system-on-a-chip for a newfangled Apple device?Or more of a straight-forward contract manufacturing--so-called foundry--relationship? Other scenarios: Gwennap believes Apple may have to get a "third-party" processor for some of its future products. "Either to develop low-cost iPhones or to reduce the burdenof developing a broad line of processors," he wrote."Qualcomm is already shipping cellular-baseband chips into Apple's newest products and would be a logical supplier if Apple were to adopt integrated processors," he wrote, adding that it will be impossible to know, however, until the products actually ship because of Apple's secrecy.In the end, what many observers tend to miss is that designing a chip is a Herculean task, even for a tech-savvy, resource-rich company like Apple, according to Gwennap. "Apple's decision to develop its own processors is paying dividends, but the company is discovering how difficult it is to be a processor supplier," Gwennap wrote.
