Nanotech - The Circuits Blog

Query: Who makes the Apple-branded chip in the iPhone? Answer: Samsung. This nontrivial detail translated into smartphone chip market share gains for Samsung in the second quarter, according to iSuppli.

Apple iPhone market share gains drove Samsung chip rise.

(Credit: Apple)

The iPhone, largely due to the popularity of the 3GS model, accounted for 13.9 percent of global smartphone shipments in the second quarter, up from 10.1 percent in the first quarter, according to iSuppli. As a result, Samsung accounted for 15.9 percent of global revenue from sales of standalone applications processors. An applications processor is roughly analogous to the main Intel or Advanced Micro Devices processor in a PC: it is basically the brains of a smartphone.

Samsung's market share was up nearly 1 percent from the first quarter, iSuppli said, though it still trailed No. 1 supplier Texas Instruments. iSuppli defines a "standalone" applications processor as digital signal- or logic-based processors not integrated with the digital baseband function.

"Since the introduction of the first (iPhone) in January 2007, Samsung has occupied the key applications processor slot in Apple's iPhone line," Francis Sideco, principal analyst of wireless communications for iSuppli, said in a statement. "With the new 3GS model allowing the iPhone to gain share in the smartphone market, Samsung also is claiming a larger portion of standalone applications processor shipments."

As with previous iPhone models, the 3GS--introduced in June--integrates a Samsung processor based on the ARM architecture. The processor accounted for $14.46, or 8.4 percent, of the materials cost of the iPhone 3GS based on pricing in late June, iSuppli said.

"The partnership between Apple and Samsung on the applications processor in the iPhone has been a major coup for Samsung, establishing it as a player in the market and allowing it to challenge the incumbent leader, Texas Instruments," Sideco said.

The big question, however, is how long a good thing will last for Samsung. Sideco added that "there is a lot of speculation as to whether Apple's acquisition of PA Semi will change the parameters of this partnership." Apple announced its purchase of PA Semi in March 2008.

One of the most rapidly circulating rumors has Apple using a PA Semi design in the upcoming Apple tablet. The latest word is that the screen size is about 10 inches diagonally, meaning that a tablet will require more processor and graphics horsepower than a smaller device like the iPhone.

Although Texas Instruments lost some share to Samsung in the second quarter, the U.S. chip giant retained its dominant position in the market, with a share of 24.4 percent. "Texas Instruments continues to lead the market on the strength of its Open Multimedia Application Platform (OMAP) line of applications processors," Sideco said.

On Monday, Samsung and Intrinsity jointly announced one of the fastest processors to date aimed at devices like Apple's iPhone.

Samsung-Intrinsity chip bound for iPhone and/or iPhone-class devices?

(Credit: Apple)

The new 1GHz chip co-developed by Austin, Texas-based Intrinsity and Samsung is similar to the processor that currently powers the iPhone 3GS: a 600MHz Samsung processor based on the ARM Cortex A8 design. U.K.-based ARM licenses its low-power chip designs to many of the world's largest chip suppliers including Samsung, Texas Instruments, Qualcomm, and, more recently, Nvidia.

The new Samsung-Intrinsity chip, code-named "Hummingbird," could be bound for a future iPhone or like device. "Yes, I think it's possible," said Tom R. Halfhill, senior analyst at the Microprocessor Report.

"Samsung could drop Hummingbird into the existing S5PC100 design with few or no changes," Halfhill said in response to an e-mail query, referring to the S5PC100 processor now used in the iPhone 3GS. "Bingo! A next-gen iPhone that could run at speeds up to 1.0GHz," he said.

Halfhill added that Samsung will likely use Hummingbird for future smartphones and discussed Hummingbird at length in an article that appeared Monday in the Microprocessor Report, where he also addressed the possibility of the chip making its way into a future Apple device.

Increasingly sophisticated smartphones will demand faster processors, according to Halfhill. One way to get there is cranking up the chip's speed--referred to as "clock speed"--something that ARM has not emphasized in the past because its designs, to date, have been all about power efficiency not about high-performance.

But that is changing. "The biggest challenge in mobile processor core design and implementation is to achieve high clock speed performance while keeping the power consumption low," said Jae Cheol Son, vice president, SOC Platform Development, System LSI Division, Samsung Electronics, in a statement.

And there's plenty of competition--one of the hallmarks of the ARM chip industry. Qualcomm is currently shipping a 1GHz ARM chip that is used in the recently-announced Toshiba TG01 smartphone. And Texas Instruments has announced that its future OMAP chips will pack multiple processing cores and hit GHz speeds.

In Intrinsity's case, to get to 1GHz it uses a 45-nanometer manufacturing process. Most ARM chips on the market today use a 65-nanometer or "fatter" process. Typically, the smaller the chip's geometries, the faster and more power efficient it is.

According to market researcher Forward Concepts, the ARM's Cortex-A family could account for about half of the total market for mobile application processors by 2013. The main processor in a smartphone is called an application processor.

Nvidia on Monday confirmed that Samsung will bring out a Netbook based on the graphics chipmaker's Ion chipset, another design that breaks the Netbook mold.

"Ion really transforms these small laptops, like the upcoming Samsung and Lenovo Ideapad S12, into fully capable notebooks," Rene Haas, general manager of notebook products at Nvidia said Monday in a statement.

Ion brings mainstream PC graphics to Netbooks, including 1080p high-definition video support and better gaming, according to Nvidia.

The disclosure of the Samsung Netbook follows the Lenovo IdeaPad S12--due in August--the first Netbook announced from a major PC maker to employ the Nvidia chip.

Upcoming Samsung Netbook based on Nvidia's Ion chipset and Intel Atom processor

(Credit: Nvidia)

Though Nvidia would not confirm specifications, Netbook Choice is reporting that the Netbook, branded the Samsung N510, is due in July and will sport an 11.6-inch screen--large for the Netbook category, where screens typically top out at about 10 inches.

The Samsung Netbook would be another manifestation, following the Lenovo IdeaPad S12, of Nvidia's efforts to break the Netbook mold as defined by Intel: a low-performance device with a screen under 11 inches in diagonal size. Nvidia claims designs like Samsung's and Lenovo's are more notebook than Netbook.

Samsung's Netbook bears Nvidia badge

(Credit: Nvidia)

"The Netbook term was created by Intel to define a segment offering a limited experience, but with Ion you don't have those same limitations," Nvidia's Haas said. "These systems can handle mainstream gaming, HD video, and new GPU-powered applications. You might as well call them notebooks, because that's what they are."

The N510 will also pack an Intel 1.66GHz N280 Atom processor, according to Netbook Choice. The N280 is Intel's latest Atom processor that, ironically, is offered to Netbook makers with supporting Intel silicon that delivers better graphics performance than previous Intel Atom technology. That Intel feature, however, is not available when a PC maker uses Nvidia's higher-performance Ion silicon that integrates Nvidia's 9400M graphics chip--the same chip used in Apple's MacBook line.

Other Samsung Netbook features include a 160GB hard disk drive, 1GB of memory, and Wi-Fi (draft-n), Bluetooth, and a Webcam, according to Netbook Choice.

Nvidia's Ion is also used in tiny desktop PCs such as the Acer AspireRevo and ASUS eeeTop.

Micron Technology is entering the graphics memory business, going up against heavyweights Samsung and Hynix.

Micron is targeting its memory at the upper mid-range of the graphics chip market

(Credit: Nvidia)

Micron, which recently vaulted to the No. 3 spot in global sales of dynamic random-access memory (DRAM), is now aiming at the market for DRAM chips used with graphics processors from Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices' ATI graphics unit.

The market for DRAM used with graphics processors is about 4 percent of the bits shipped into the DRAM market, according to Micron. DRAM is typically used as the main memory in PCs. This type of DRAM is also referred to as Synchronous DRAM, or SDRAM.

"Our upcoming 50-nanometer technology is very competitive when it comes to power consumption and performance," Robert Feurle, Micron's VP of DRAM marketing, said in a phone interview Thursday.

"I think it's a good point in time to begin discussions with big enablers Nvidia and AMD and get started with some design-ins," Feurle said.

Micron is making its debut with Double Date Rate 3 (DDR3) memory. This is the same type of memory used for the main memory of currently shipping PCs, which have gravitated from DDR2. In the future, Micron will look at making more proprietary graphics memory, referred to as GDDR3 and GDDR5. "No decision has been made yet but we're looking into that very seriously," Feurle said.

Initially, Micron is targeting the "upper mid-range" of the graphics processor market.

Micron says its DDR3 has a distinct power consumption advantage over GDDR3: standard DDR3 can go down to 1.35 volts. "GDDR3 is still running a 1.8 volts. We have a giant power savings advantage," he said.

Micron is targeting memory with speeds of 1600MHz "to get started with and going up from there," Feurle said.

The DRAM market overall has seen sliding sales, falling 20 percent in the first quarter from the fourth quarter and 44 percent from the year-earlier period, according to iSuppli. The problem is overcapacity, which has most notably brought Taiwan memory makers to their knees. In that country, some manufacturers have faced possible bankruptcy.

"Micron now has renewed its competitive vigor, mainly due to its acquisition of a 300mm fab from Inotera in Taiwan," iSuppli said recently. Fab refers to fabrication facility or factory.

The precise specifications for many iPhone chips are murky. Should Apple be more open about its secret ingredients?

We know the precise dimensions of the outside of the iPhone--but what's inside?

(Credit: Apple)

Granted, many people don't care about the silicon inside their iPhone. They just want it to work. That said, I think more than a few people would like to see the specifications for the iPhone's core silicon posted on Apple's Web site.

By comparison, take your typical laptop. Prospective buyers are able to see the exact specifications and make an informed buying decision. Though the iPhone isn't offered in different processor SKUs (models) like a laptop, the iPhone comes close to a PC in its capabilities and demands more disclosure.

Nikkei's TechOn Web site takes a stab at what the iPhone's main chip might be--generically referred to as an application(s) processor: "An LSI (large-scale integrated circuit) printed with Apple Inc.'s logo ("339S0036 ARM K4X1G163PC-DGC3") was embedded on the center right of the board. It was assumed to be an application processor with an ARM core. Because it included a letter string beginning with 'K,' it seemed to be manufactured by Samsung Electronics Co Ltd. of Korea."

Semiconductor Insights is a little more specific, saying it's a "Samsung ARM11-based design."

Here's my point: Am I getting a smartphone with a Samsung, Texas Instruments, Qualcomm, Freescale, Nvidia or Intel processor? As high-end smartphones proliferate (such as those based on Intel's upcoming "Moorestown" processor), it would be useful to know up front who makes the applications processor and other core silicon and what the rated performance-per-watt of that chip is. And right now, the iPhone is the most prominent high-end smartphone.

Don't think smartphone makers should go down the same path as laptops, which are plastered with Intel, AMD, ATI, Nvidia, and Microsoft stickers? Maybe not. But more about what makes the device tick could only be helpful.

Would anybody else like to know?

IBM, Samsung Electronics, STMicroelectronics, and others are teaming up on the development of next-generation chip technology for small, low-power devices with one wary eye on Intel, which is expediting its move to chips with smaller geometries.

(Credit: IBM)

IBM and its semiconductor technology alliance partners are announcing the availability of 28-nanometer (nm) chip technology, a little more than a generation beyond the 45nm technologies currently used by Intel and Advanced Micro Devices in their latest chips.

The first products using chips based on this technology are expected in the second half of 2010, an IBM spokesman said. Devices will include smartphones and consumer electronics products.

The largest, single countervailing force to the IBM-led group is Intel. The Santa Clara, Calif.-based chip giant's chief executive, Paul Otellini, said Tuesday in a first-quarter earnings conference call that Intel is "pulling in" the release of "Westmere" chips based on 32nm technology and will ship silicon later this year.

Generally, the smaller the geometry, the faster and more power efficient the chip is.

The IBM alliance--which also includes the AMD manufacturing spin-off Globalfoundries, Chartered Semiconductor, and Infineon Technologies--are jointly developing the 28nm chipmaking process based on the partners' "high-k metal gate" (which minimizes current leakage), low-power complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) process technology.

The technology "can provide a 40 percent performance improvement and a more than 20 percent reduction in power, in a chip that is half the size, compared with 45nm technology," IBM said in a statement. "These improvements enable microchip designs with outstanding performance, smaller feature sizes and low standby power, contributing to faster processing speed and longer battery life in next-generation mobile Internet devices and other systems."

IBM said customers can begin their designs now using 32nm technology and then transition to 28nm for density and power advantages without the need for a major redesign.

One prominent customer is U.K.-based ARM, whose basic chip design has been used in billions of devices all over the world. ARM is collaborating with the IBM alliance to develop a design platform for 32nm and 28nm technology and is tuning its Cortex processor family and future processors to exploit the technology's capabilities, IBM said.

Samsung's NC20 Netbook shows that Via Technologies' Nano processor can keep up with the Joneses. But will Nvidia be given the chance?

CNET Reviews' Dan Ackerman reviewed the new Samsung NC20 Netbook and found it not wanting in a matchup with the Asus Eee PC 1000HE, packing Intel's latest and greatest Atom N280.

Samsung NC20 Netbook packs a Via Nano processor--not an Intel Atom.

(Credit: CNET Reviews)

Though Nano is a necessary industry antidote to Intel's grip on the Netbook market, in the scheme of market share numbers, Via's chip is a blip at best.

I find it almost amusing when Intel lists Via as one of two competitors (Advanced Micro Devices being the other) in its Form 10-K filings. It's a fair analogy to say it's like a mom-and-pop coffee shop among a dense cluster of Starbucks stores. You may draw a few customers but 99 percent of the market is going to go to Starbucks.

Via helped pioneer the Netbook market in early 2008 by powering one of the earliest high-profile products, the Hewlett-Packard 2133 Mini-Note. In fact, Via was already supplying the inexpensive, low-power Via C7M--Nano's predecessor--in 2005 when the Atom concept was just a glimmer in Intel's eye.

The Netbook market vacuum didn't last long, however. Within months of Atom's arrival, the Via C7M was squashed by the Intel juggernaut, not to rise again. (Largely due to the fact that the C7M was slow, as one reader points out.)

The sober reality is that Via faces the same daunting challenge that Nvidia does: competing with Intel. The largest Netbook vendors--Asus and Acer--are wedded to Intel processors and chipsets, as are most of the other major players. An incremental increase in processor performance from Via won't necessarily tempt PC makers to drop Atom.

Nvidia's predicament is even more difficult because the GPU supplier can offer something that Intel can't: great graphics performance in a Netbook.

Nvidia faces a Catch 22. It needs a lot of Netbook design wins to make decent profit margins but customers won't sign up for Nvidia's Ion in the face of Intel's bundling incentives.

Alas, Nvidia's Ion seems destined only for tiny desktops for now. Nvidia has been shopping its Ion platform (Atom + Nvidia 9400M graphics) around and has had some success with top-tier PC companies looking to design diminutive desktops. But not any success to date in the Netbook space (although some smaller Asia-based Netbook makers are expected to announce Ion-based Netbooks at Computex in June).

Then there's Tegra. This Nvidia chip platform may have more success in the category of so-called "$99" Netbooks that are more akin--in the way they are offered to customers--to cell phones than laptops. These Netbooks, as depicted by Qualcomm, would be always-on and not part of the WinTel (Windows-Intel) ecosystem.

Nvidia went out of its way this week to demonstrate a concept device at CTIA in Las Vegas running Windows CE. Nvidia basically tore out the guts of an Intel-based HP Mini 1000 Netbook and replaced it with Tegra parts, according to a Nvidia spokesman Derek Perez, who attended CTIA this week.

Samsung expects solid-state drives to reach price parity with hard-disk drives within the next few years amid steep annual price declines in flash memory chips.

Solid-state drives, which use flash memory chips as the storage medium, typically offer much better performance than hard-disk drives. But they cost more. Currently, opting for an SSD instead of a hard-disk drive will add anywhere between $100 and $600 to the cost of a laptop, depending on the capacity of the SSD.

Dell's Alienware Area-51 laptop (above) and Dell's Studio XPS 16 come with a 256GB solid-state drive option

(Credit: Dell)

In a phone interview, Brian Beard, flash marketing manager for Samsung Semiconductor, said reaching price parity with hard-disk drives is just a matter of time. "Flash memory in the last five years has come down 40, 50, 60 percent per year," he said. "Flash on a dollar-per-gigabyte basis will reach price parity, at some point, with hard disk drives in the next few years." Samsung makes both SSDs and HDDs.

Beard explained why a cost gap persists between solid-state drives and hard-disk drives. "The difference in cost is fundamentally very different. A hard drive has a fixed cost of $40 or $50 for the spindle, the motors, the PCB (printed circuit board), the cables," he said. "To make the hard drive spin faster (increase speed) or to add capacity doesn't really add a lot of incremental cost to the drive." (The price for most laptop-class hard-disk drives on the market is between $60 and $100 at retail, Beard said.)

"When you contrast this with SSDs, they also have a fixed cost for the PCB and the case and the controller, which is lower than the fixed cost of a hard drive," according to Beard. "But as you scale the capacity of the SSD up, the cost scales linearly. For example, if the spot price of the flash chip itself is $2, a 64GB drive is going to cost $128 just for the flash and then you would add the fixed cost of the PCB and the case, he said. So, the cost will double as you double the capacity, according to Beard.

This argument, however, works in favor of lower solid-state drive pricing too--as flash memory prices drop and densities and capacities increase. And Beard added that "there's a lot of pressure for OEMs (PC makers) to match the price to the traditional pricing in the hard-drive industry." Samsung is also a PC maker and faces the same pressures.

And what will happen to the price of SSDs this year? "The rest of the year is quite unpredictable. Because the SSD price is directly tied to the price of flash, no one knows. Everyone is just giving their best guess as to what will happen in the flash market," he said. To date, flash memory prices have dropped so much that chipmakers can't make money.

"Every major flash manufacturer posted major losses in Q4. So flash and SSD manufacturers are under a lot of pressure to make a profit," Beard said.

Where is the price-per-gigabyte sweet spot for solid-state drives going to be later this year? "On the business side, the sweet spot is 64(GB) moving to 128. On the consumer side it's definitely 128 moving to 256," he said.

Samsung SSDs with a capacity of 256GB have been shipping since January. Dell offers these drives in some laptop models already. 256GB drives are just now "rolling out into mass production," Beard said. "We'll start shipping it to some of our smaller customers about right now."

Note: Currently, on a Dell Studio XPS 16, opting for a 128GB SSD instead of a 7200rpm 320GB HDD adds $200 to the price of the system. Opting for a 256GB SSD adds $400.

SanDisk is disclosing at a San Francisco technology conference Tuesday that it will begin mass production of memory chips that will allow consumers to store up to 64GB of data on tiny flash cards.

SanDisk X4 memory chip packs in four bits per cell

(Credit: SanDisk)

The Milpitas, Calif., company's X4 technology will pack four bits of data into each memory cell. To date, flash memory chipmakers typically stored one bit or two bits per cell.

SanDisk--the largest supplier of retail flash cards--is making the disclosure jointly with Toshiba at the 2009 International Solid State Circuits Conference (ISSCC). The two companies will use 43-nanometer manufacturing process technology to make the chips.

X4 technology, which SanDisk got when it purchased M-Systems in 2006, will yield tiny Secure Digital (SD) flash cards that hold 64GB of data. Currently, mainstream SanDisk SD cards top out at 16GB, though pricey 32GB cards are also on the market.

"It is a 64-gigabit single die (chip), which is 8GB (per die), the highest capacity point in the industry," said Khandker Quader, senior vice president, memory technology & product development, SanDisk, in a phone interview Monday.

In addition to the memory chip, the die also includes an X4 controller--which manages the data flow. The memory and controller "will be sold as an integrated solution," Quader said. Controllers are the secret sauce used by flash card and solid-state drive suppliers to boost performance. The importance of controllers increases as flash chip densities increase because higher densities require increasingly sophisticated controllers to deliver the necessary performance.

The memory technology itself--the 4 bits per cell 64-gigabit memory--is co-developed and co-owned by SanDisk and Toshiba. The X4 controller technology is solely owned by SanDisk, Quader said. SanDisk and Toshiba also have joint manufacturing facilities in Japan.

The advancement is important because NAND flash--like all silicon chasing Moore's Law--is facing challenges to increase densities "even at two bits and three bits per cell," he said. (NAND is the type of memory used in flash cards and solid-state drives.)

A SanDisk paper at the ISSCC will discuss the performance of the X4 technology. Data speeds will hit 7.8 megabytes per second, Quader said. "This is comparable to what others are producing at lower bits per cell," he said.

X4 flash cards will be available commercially in the first half of 2009, according to Quader.

SanDisk will also present a paper on 32-nanometer X3 technology--three bits per cell--for use in thumbnail-size microSD cards (even smaller than SD cards) that boast capacities up to 16GB. X3 will also be used in solid-state drives, SanDisk said.

Despite these advancements, SanDisk is still a laggard in the emerging solid-state drive market, where companies like Samsung, Toshiba, Micron Technology, and Intel are the early leaders. SanDisk announced at CES in January that it would deliver a 240GB SSD by mid-year.