What are we about ?

Scalable IP, configurable platforms is what we are about.

Then starts talking about PURE !!! Same line about "if you knew what's coming" has been wheeled out. Still only talking about DAB and multi-room though. Is there really anything else ?

Slide 36

There is yet another new type of xPU - Ensigma NPU - network processing unit. Specific to data centre processor applications - high speed routing. Top end Explorer cores as far as I can tell.

MIPS

"Like a very talented child in a family that doesn't care"

Very good.

But still convinced that the market is that bothered about having an alternative to ARM. Your correspondent remains to be convinced the market wanted much more than a bargaining chip. So far this has been an expensive experiment. Let's hope we start reaching some conclusions soon.

More slides

Not sure if we're going to be told the 2nd takeaway slide, but we're on to the usual power per mm etc slides and the performance envelope stuff.

SHY still seems to see us as being way ahead of everyone else on performance.

Same stuff again from last year about camera stuff and integration of GPU compute functions, etc. good to see we're keeping on top of our recycling targets.

Takeaway slides

If you go away with only 2 slides, take this  (slide 21) as one of them. It's a version of the old adoption graph.

Unfortunately we're not really in the 90% of the CPU business that is IP. Or to be honest the GPU business any longer, but we remain hopeful.

Future is about getting our 200+ Ensigma engineers to bring the RPU tab along the curve.

Strategic Progress

Unlike competitors, we do not demand our customers take x,y,z we make things to be interoperable with other technologies.

OK, but competitors are more successful than us at selling IP so who really wins here ?

Very interesting new slide 11 - where on earth these licensees are coming from or who they are I have no idea and I'm sure we're not going to get told.

Blah blah blah

I don't intend to comment on individual slides this year unless there's something that leaps out at me as SHY goes through the usual slides. They're on the website soon so you can look yourselves.

He's started off talking about how our business is about predicting and forecasting future markets. Ahem.......given our last 18 months or so you have to wonder how we're still in business but at least we're aiming for something.

In reference to wireless technologies and our place in it he reckons PURE will reveal all sometime early next year. Sound familiar ?

AGM 2014

Good morning and welcome to this year's AGM coverage.

A smaller gathering of the clans, maybe a lot of disgruntled Yes voters from north of the border have decided that last night's results were too disappointing to get out of bed.

Can't imagine this is going to be pretty.

Imagination IMS

IMG today announced the Interim Management Statement:

Imagination Technologies Group plc ('Imagination', LSE: IMG, ‘the Group’), a leading multimedia, communications and processor technology company, is today issuing its Interim Management Statement for the period from 1 May 2014 to 16 September 2014.

Trading update

Licensing activity in the period has been good with encouraging levels of activity across all three main IP product areas and across the broad customer base.

Royalty revenue for the quarter ended 30 June 2014 has been in line with our expectations, reflecting both growth from a number of partners as well as the short term impact from known product transitions with other partners this year. We are pleased that the average royalty rate for the quarter remained strong and marginally higher than last year, which we expected given the change in product mix.

The active licensing pipeline across our IP and customer base is building the foundation for significant future unit growth.

Both licensing and royalty revenue have been affected by the strength of sterling in the period, leading to adverse comparisons with the prior year. Given the recent volatility of sterling, it is difficult to predict the likely impact of this factor for the financial year to April 2015. However, we continue to be active in hedging some of our exposure to currency movements.

The Pure business is trading in line with expectations following the renewed focus and organisational changes implemented at the end of FY14. We are expecting further progress with the latest product releases.

Despite the Group continuing to invest in a number of key areas, tight operational control has been maintained and underlying operating costs are growing at a lower rate and in line with expectations.

Technology business

Multimedia

Our PowerVR Series6 technology has seen further deployment with active licensing across all areas of the Series6 family including 6XE and 6XT.

PowerVR Series6/6XT continues to drive leading edge devices delivering best industry performance, feature set and lowest power consumption.

We were pleased to announce the industry’s smallest Android compatible GPU solution with the new PowerVR Series5XE GX5300 graphics core. With this our partners can create compelling GUIs and user experiences with longer battery life for a range of low-cost, area constrained applications.

CPU and processor cores

We recently announced our most significant new MIPS CPU IP core to date, the 64-bit I6400, the first core using the latest r6 architecture. This highly configurable I-class MIPS core targets a broad range of high volume market applications.

Licences have already been signed with multiple lead partners who value the unique features of this core, such as multi-threading and advanced security, as well as its area and power efficiency.

The Group now provides a comprehensive range of MIPS IP cores for everything from microcontrollers and Internet of Things (IoT) devices to 64-bit application processors and servers, delivering choice across the full range.

We recently revealed the first of a series of MIPS-based development boards targeted at the open source community, hobbyists, cross platform developers and partners looking to create applications using our IP portfolio. We have seen an exceptional response which bodes well for the continued ecosystem development.

Communications

Interest in the Ensigma product range remains strong with additional licenses signed during the period.

The Ensigma ‘Whisper’ RPU is designed to drive a new generation of wearables, IoT and other connected devices where ultra-low power consumption and low cost points are key.

Lead customers who have licensed the high performance ‘Explorer’ RPU IP are making good progress towards their first mass production devices.

Ecosystem

Progress and support of the prpl open source foundation continues with the founders and other partners strongly driving activities in this area.

Imagination’s partners gathered to discover and discuss the latest in our strategy and products at a series of Summit and Executive events worldwide which, over the period, attracted well over 1,000 engineers, developers and executives.

Pure business

Following the renewed focus and organisational adjustment, Pure is applying itself to driving markets and technologies that are of strategic significance to the Group’s overall business.

A new family of products has recently been launched which combines DAB with wireless streaming capability and which we believe will help to drive the emerging consumer trends. This should create more demand for the refreshed Evoke range of products.

The Jongo X family, that takes multi-room streaming to a new level both in feature set and sound quality, has just been launched at the IFA consumer electronics show with a positive reception.

We are seeing strong interest in licensing of the underlying technologies that power these showcase products.

Outlook

The progress on licensing in the period supports our target of 10% growth in licensing revenue for the year.

Non-MIPS shipments are expected to increase in the financial year, with a strong weighting towards the second half, predominantly driven by new product launches. MIPS shipments are expected to be broadly flat year on year with significant growth expected in future years, arising from the ongoing strong licensing activity.

New products and the impact of the business refocus and organisational changes made in FY14 are on course to deliver an improvement in Pure’s financial performance in the year to April 2015.

Underlying operating cost growth is expected to be reduced to around 10% this year, in line with previous guidance.

The seasonality of royalty revenues and the normal weighting of licensing revenues typically results in a stronger financial performance in the second half of the financial year. Given the anticipated contribution of new product shipments later in the year, we expect this effect to be more pronounced this year.

The overall financial position of Imagination remains robust and the Board is confident that the Group’s progress will continue in line with its expectations.

Sir Hossein Yassaie , Chief Executive, commented:

"We continue to see good progress being made across our three main IP product families, multimedia, processors and communications.

"The launch of MIPS 64-bit cores, which can be used in a broad range of high volume applications, is a significant milestone in our development and is seen as an industry changing step by many.

"The three IP families and the platforms they enable are increasingly seen as a strong and relevant proposition for the existing and emerging opportunities by many of our customers."

END

No great surprises then. IMG seem to have learned a lesson from this time last year, when the royalty volume estimate (with only 6w of the financial half to go) turned out to be nonsense. Licensing on track, reduced volumes in H1 due to lower Mediatek (as they mainly ship MT65x2 Mali series at present) but no doubt the effect of people waiting to buy iPhone 6 (as mentioned by Apple last quarter) rather than iPhone 5c/s in recent months.  Costs seem under control and Pure not doing as bad (should still be sold off imo). The now-weaker Sterling could turn out well for H2 as volumes ramp.

I will be joining Hammerd at AGM in 2 days and will feedback then.

Wee Timor-IMS Beastie

An IMS is an odd wee critter, not unlike the Highland Haggis in that it's one leg (the bit before the IMS since the last results) is significantly longer than the other (the bit between the IMS and the end of the current period). And, of course, they can either be delicious or make you gag.

Unfortunately you rarely know the day before whether you'll be enjoying the reporting version of soft  organic barley oats melting in the mouth in a savoury jus of delicate lites or chewing hard on a piece of unimaginably unpleasant gristle.

Today, however, we know that tomorrow morning we're in for a decidedly middle of the road, mass produced piece of mush that will please no-one and make many wonder how on earth this once proud producer of fine, meaty comestibles has been laid so low, how these pallid ingredients could have cost this much and where the sheep will be coming from to stuff these beauties full of hot goodness in years to come.

So, we know that licensing (stomach lining) will be lower than H2 last year, we know that royalty units (barley oats) will be probably down also, that MIPS (lungs) will 'be contributing financially to the Group', that there is increased interest in our other families of IP (meaty goodness) and that PURE is incredibly important to the future of our IP being adopted throughout industry as a whole (it isn't).

So will anyone be happy ? No. Will anybody be surprised ? No. Will we really know any more tomorrow at 7am than we've known for months ? No.

Will the SP drop yet further when it's flagged (again) that any (note any, not the) possible growth this year will be most decidedly in H2.

This long term investor is expecting higher losses in H1 than we had in last year's figures with the hope of some H2 recovery, so anything better than that will be a huge bonus. I'm actually expecting much higher FY reported losses this year given the current level of sales so far predicted and the fact that you can't just stop expenses dead when they're mostly in R&D and no-one's been sacked. The only reductions possible would be the absence of redundancy payments to MIPS sales teams.

Ho him, tomorrow's another day, and Friday's another day too.

Let's just hope we can take delivery of one more succulent, juicy, spicey organic Haggis before the maurauding Northmen sever their ties with Westminster. Unfortunately that's it likely either.

Upcoming AGM

It's been quite a year for us Imagineers with the company managing to blow off much of the goodwill built up over the past 15+ years with the ease and speed of a Dutchman blowing the froth off his beer.

In just over a year of tall tales and missed targets and opportunities we have gone from a company on the up, aiming for that far away, glistening FTSE100 target so beloved of our CEO to a nearly ran company who have seen soaring profits plummet to losses with more expected this year too, hockey stick increases in royalty levels drop and many of our long term and important partners either drop off the map altogether or severely curtail their output.

We've heard much of the future promise, but these statements ring hollower than a Scotsman's legs on Burns' night now they've been rolled out more times than a Cockney's barrel on sing song night.

But we are Imagineers - not for us the easy path, the path well trodden on simple trajectories from loss to ever increasing profits, the path of least resistance. No, we must have more than our share of pain and suffering on our journey to the fabled Land of Jam Tomorrow.

And so it is with a heavy heart (and a much lighter wallet thanks to the ever decreasing SP and ever increasing rail fares) that a smaller than normal band of merry and intrepid warriors (no pun intended) head once more to Kings Langley to hold some feet to some fires and try to get to the bottom of what has gone so disastrously wrong with our company and what is being done to actually turn things around.

WiFi - and First Great Western - willing there will once more be a live blog for you all to digest. Let's hope the words don't stick in anyone's throats.

Will this be the last IMG AGM ? I'm convinced it will be, so maybe the sweepstake this year will be moot.

A bientot mes braves !!

MIPS 64-Bit Warrior Core announced

The much awaited announcement today from IMG:

http://www.imgtec.com/news/detail.asp?ID=923

Imagination Technologies Group plc (LSE: IMG, “Imagination”, “the Group”), a leading multimedia, communications and processor technology company, has launched the highly-efficient MIPS I-class I6400 CPU family.

This is a key strategic development for the Group as this 64-bit MIPS Warrior core is the first IP core to combine a 64-bit architecture and hardware virtualization with scalable performance through multi-threading, multi-core and multi-cluster coherent processing.

MIPS Warrior I-class processor cores set a new standard for mainstream 64-bit processing in applications including embedded, mobile, digital consumer, advanced communications, networking and storage - the broadest set of applications ever addressed by a single MIPS core family.

Its extraordinary feature set and performance/power/area leadership will enable customers to implement a smaller core at the same performance, or a faster core, in the same area.

Sir Hossein Yassaie, Chief Executive, commented:

"This is the MIPS Warrior core that the industry has been waiting for. Customers can now choose a CPU based on its technical superiority.

"This new product is more efficient, flexible and scalable than the competition and its feature set clearly lends itself to the needs of a wide range of next-generation applications including smartphones and tablets.

"We know that unique features like multi-threading provide significant advantages for many applications. We have already secured licensees for this new product across multiple markets.

"The Group is now able to provide MIPS IP cores for everything from microcontrollers to 64-bit servers, delivering choice across the range and changing the competitive dynamic in the industry."

Says Tony King-Smith, EVP marketing, Imagination: “This is the MIPS Warrior core that many have been waiting for. As the industry moves toward instruction set neutrality, customers can now choose a CPU based on its technical superiority. The I6400 is more efficient, flexible and scalable than the competition, and its feature set clearly lends itself to the needs of a wide range of next-generation applications including smartphones and tablets. We know that unique features like multi-threading provide significant advantages for many applications, and customers already using this technology agree. Unsurprisingly, we’ve already secured licensees for the I6400 across multiple markets.”

Says Jim McGregor, founder and principal analyst, Tirias Research: “To address the ongoing evolution in applications from IoT to mobile to networking and storage, companies need to select scalable platforms that can future-proof their designs. With 64-bit, multi-threading, and multicore/multi-cluster support, the I6400 is designed to be a phenomenally flexible, low-power processor architecture capable of scaling across a wide range of applications. Imagination now has MIPS IP cores for everything from microcontrollers to 64-bit servers, delivering choice across the range and changing the competitive dynamic in the industry.”