Imagination scores huge win at HiSilicon

Imagination today announced a hugely significant win at HiSilicon. This is very exciting news for several reasons:

1. HiSilicon is essentially the chip arm of Huawei (spun off in 2004), the large Chinese OEM with global ambitions and plenty of financial muscle to back it up. HiSilicon made news at MWC (Barcelona) with its K3V2 quad-core processor with '16 core GPU' (turned out to be Vivante designed). Clearly, they didn't want to settle for Vivante (or any other cheap solution eg.Mali) and wisely,went for the best.
2. The license is for multiple IP across the PowerVR range (ie. it's a biggie), including graphics, video and display cores.
3. HiSilicon becomes the 9th PowerVR Rogue licensee (5 named, 4 not confirmed). The top companies are keen to secure the best future graphics technologies and ecosystems.

The PR:

Imagination Technologies Group plc (LSE: IMG; "Imagination"), a leader in System-on-Chip Intellectual Property ("SoC IP"), has signed a license agreement with HiSilicon Technologies Co., Ltd. ("HiSilicon") covering multiple PowerVR multimedia IP cores from Imagination, including graphics, video and display technologies. Under the license agreement HiSilicon has licensed a member of the PowerVR Series6 'Rogue' GPU graphics family.

HiSilicon will deploy Imagination’s technology in SoCs targeting the mobile and consumer markets.

Under the terms of its licensing arrangements, Imagination receives licence fees and royalty revenues on SoCs incorporating Imagination's IP.
END

Separately the CEO Hossein Yassaie has been featured in a number of press interviews lately, and here is the latest one:

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/article-2138580/CITY-INTERVIEW-The-quiet-Iranian-smart-phones.html#ixzz1tmt9fq5f

Sunplus Technology Extends Relationship with Imagination

Since much earlier license agreements for PowerVR MBX (old days) we haven't heard much from Sunplus. So it was a nice surprise for IMGers to see this PR today:

Imagination Technologies Group plc (LSE: IMG; "Imagination"), a leader in System-on-Chip Intellectual Property ("SoC IP"), has signed a license agreement with Sunplus Technology Co., Ltd. ("Sunplus") (TAIEX: 2401, LSE: SUPD) for IP from Imagination's PowerVR SGX graphics family.
Sunplus will deploy Imagination's PowerVR SGX graphics technology in SoCs targeting the Home Entertainment market.
Says Dr. Archie Yeh, President of Sunplus:
"Advanced graphics performance is becoming increasingly important for future Home Multimedia System. We are pleased to extend our partnership with Imagination Technologies, the leader in embedded graphics, for Sunplus' SoC products."
Says Tony King-Smith, VP marketing, Imagination:
"We are pleased that, having assessed the available technologies, Sunplus has again selected PowerVR. This latest expansion of our partnership will help both companies to further drive and exploit the latest graphics trends."
Under the terms of its licensing arrangements, Imagination receives licence fees and royalty revenues on SoCs incorporating Imagination's IP.
END

TKS is of course referring to cheaper (but inferior in terms of both graphics ,ecosystem and support) alternatives such as Mali and Vivante.
Sunplus are another Taiwanese player focused on SoCs for BD players, HDTVs and STBs.
ARM continue to make a lot of noise regarding Mali's supposed 70% (?) market share of 3D HW graphics enabled HDTVs, but IMG have the following significant partners in this area:

MStar (2013) - no.1
Mediatek - no.2
LG
Sigma Designs/Trident
Intel
NEC/Renesas
NXP
Sunplus
Fujitsu
SiS
Qualcomm (Display and UCC cores)

IMG will soon be making significant in-roads to that 70% figure imo. Then there's always the prospect of a future real Apple TV...


In other news, Amazon's blowout Q1 revealed the Kindle Fire remains the no.1 item on Amazon.com since launch.  Research firm comScore revealed Kindle Fire has taken 54.4% of US market share of Android tablets in February.
Lastly, Mediatek just came out with Q2 figures and raised their target of smartphone chipsets to 75m for the year (up from 50m) - pretty much all of these are IMG'd (see SoC list). Great stuff !

Apple Q2 numbers

Another stunning set of numbers from Apple last night.
For iOS (IMG'd) devices we have:

iPhone = 35.1m (well above forecasts)
iPad = 11.8m ( just above forecasts and only includes 2 weeks of new iPad sales)
iPod = 7.7m (above forecast, over 50% again iPod Touch)
no numbers given for Apple TV this time
The total iOS devices for the quarter was over 50m

This gives the following running totals from 1/4/2011 - 31/3/2012 (Apple's last 4 quarters):

iPhone = 109.2m
iPad = 47.5m
iPod Touch = 19-20m
Plus 3-4m Apple TV

Giving a total of approx. 179m iOS devices in that time period .
IMG's year runs from 1/5/2011-30/4/2012, so this translates to massive royalty volume for IMG in FY 2011/12. The IMG guidance of 300-320m royalty volume for this FY looks comfortable certainly.

Full transcript with Q&A here:
http://seekingalpha.com/article/524451-apple-s-ceo-discusses-q2-2012-results-earnings-call-transcript

Imagination signs up Qualcomm for Ensigma UCC

Qualcomm, the undisputed leader of the mobile chips world, has signed up for Ensigma UCC IP, which is used in  broadcast, communications and connectivity chips. This is a major endorsement of Ensigma UCC, and Qualcomm becomes the 2nd Tier One licensee of this technology (other one suspected ,but not confirmed, to be Broadcom).

It is also a broadening/deepening of the IMG/Qualcomm relationship, which will hopefully extend into PowerVR Graphics/Video in the near future.

Until now, analysts (even the bulls), have not modeled revenue for the Ensigma division, but with this announcement things may be about to change imo.

PR:

Imagination Technologies Group plc (LSE: IMG; "Imagination"), a leader in System-on-Chip Intellectual Property ("SoC IP"), has signed a license agreement with Qualcomm Incorporated (Nasdaq: QCOM), a world leader in 3G and next-generation mobile technologies, for certain IP from Imagination’s Ensigma UCC broadcast, communications and connectivity IP family.
Under the terms of its licensing arrangements, Imagination receives license fees and royalty revenues

END


Well done all at IMG.

Imagination market share update

Recently, JPR put out a release stating Qualcomm were the dominant player in mobile graphics with 33% market share.

Closer analysis showed IMG's share was at least 50% if you added up the various suppliers (Apple, TI etc) in his table ,but he made no comment about IMG at the time.

A few weeks later and we have this 'update' , demonstrating PowerVR are the clear leaders in terms of graphics IP, whichever way you wanna slice it. IMG's PR chief Dave Harold puts the suppliers market share at over 60% currently (rather than the 50% in the chart). Even more impressive is the near 80% share when GPU IP companies only are considered (takes out Qualcomm).

Vivante has also put in a respectable performance, beating both Nvidia and ARM Mali (!) - courtesy of Marvell pretty much (family connection).

The IMG bear analysts have been crowing for some time about how Mali and Nvidia are 'catching up' to PowerVR, no doubt they will ignore this report and make up some fantasy numbers instead.

A/V market shares (DTV,STB etc) are not included but would also make interesting reading given the strength of IMG's partners - Intel, Sigma Design,Renesas,LG, Mediatek, MStar. STM...

http://www.powermanagementdesignline.com/electronics-news/4304118/Imagination-outstrips-all-other-GPU-IP-suppliers

According to the latest research of the embedded graphics market by Jon Peddie Research (JPR), Imagination Technologies supplies more GPU IP then all other suppliers combined.

The research provides estimated mobile devices graphics chip shipments for 2011. Increasingly mobile devices have a graphics processor and those processors are integrated in the device’s system on a chip (SoC) application processor.

Application processors are made by a dozen plus semiconductor manufacturers including Broadcom, Intel, Marvell, MediaTek, Nvidia, ST-Ericson, Renesas, Texas Instruments, Qualcomm, Samsung, and others. All these companies fall into one of two categories, vertically integrated, and IP buyers.

Nvidia, Qualcomm and ZiiLabs are the vertically integrated companies with their own GPU designs; all the others buy GPU IP from one of five IP suppliers, ARM, DMP, Imagination Technologies, Takumi, and Vivante.

The exceptions to this tidy categorization, says JPR are Broadcom and Samsung which buy IP and also have an internal GPU design. Apple makes an SoC, but does not sell it commercially.

GPU IP only suppliers market share

The leading high volume suppliers of application processors are Apple, Texas Instruments, Qualcomm, and Samsung. Three of the four use Imagination Technologies’ GPU IP as well as several other smaller competitors.

Market share of mobile devices GPU IP

Other SoC suppliers buying GPU IP include Actions Semiconductor, Freescale, Huawei, Ingenic, Rockchip, and Wonder Media/VIA. These companies have products in the feature phone market; some are just entering the smartphone and tablet segment.

JPR says it expects the market share to be shift dramatically through 2012 as the existing players get more aggressive, customers lose share, and two new IP companies to enter the market.

Imagination says it has eight licensees for its Series 6 cores including: ST-Ericsson, Texas Instruments, Renesas and MediaTek (plus JPR believes  Apple, Intel, and Samsung). This is along with MStar, Ricoh and Rockchip, joining existing partners like Sony, Sigma and Realtek for the company’s PowerVR Series5 family.

Vivante is the surprising number two in IP GPU suppliers. Products incorporating Vivante technologies are based on the Marvell Armada and PXA communications processor. The PXA920 ships in mass market China Mobile OMS and Android TD smartphones from ASUS, Huawei, Lenovo, Samsung, ZTE and many others.

Vivante’s other licensees include Texas Instruments, Freescale, HiSilicon, Ingenic, Rockchip, and many more. Included in JPR's definition of 'mobile' are Smartphones, high-end feature phones, tablets, portable game consoles, cameras, and vehicles. JPR believes that plenoptic cameras with interactive performance using GPUs and embedded cameras with GPUs like Lytro and Ximea will show up this year.

JPR did not include navigational units as it couldn't find many that used a GPU and specifically excluded TVs, STBs, DVD players, watches, MP3 players, and digital picture frames.

JPR believes that as GPU IP prices drop and the quest for differentiation continues, combined with everything being on-line all the time, and the internet of things, GPUs will find their way into these other devices. But, it didn’t happen in 2011.

END

Confident IMS from Imagination Technologies

Imagination today gave its IMS, a very confident statement all round.
Licensing - remains robust after an excellent H1
Royalty volume - 300-320m indicated for full year, (H1 123m) , so the 'substantial acceleration' in volume IMG predicted at H1 results is materialising during H2 (177-197m for H2).
Royalty rate - expecting at least 31c/chip (blended)
Ensigma UCCP3 - sounds like more licensing has taken place
Even PURE does not sound too bad.

No doubt HY will be on top form during the CC this morning.

Imagination Technologies Group plc ('Imagination', LSE: IMG), a leading multimedia, communications and embedded processor technology company, is today issuing its Interim Management Statement for the period from 1 November 2011 to 7 March 2012.
Trading update
Following the strong performance in the first half of the financial year, the momentum in the business continued. The Group’s revenue showed good growth against last year as expected.
A combination of new product launches, the traditional holiday period uplift and continuing momentum across the customer base, all contributed to the expected ramp in royalty volumes (quarter ended December 2011). Royalty rates remain firm as the proportion of royalty volume incorporating newer IP was maintained.
Steady progress in licensing continued, following high levels of activity in the first half. The Group signed new licences with both existing and new customers across all key IP product families.
Despite the tough UK retail environment and weak global consumer demand, PURE revenues remained marginally ahead of last year. The strong growth in overseas markets continued.
Technology update
PowerVR graphics & video - the first two Series6 ‘Rogue architecture’ cores were launched in January (PowerVR G6200, G6400). PowerVR Series6 graphics delivers up to 20x performance improvement over the previous generation comparable GPU cores, targeting the same markets. Production versions of the IP cores have been shipped to lead customers.
The optimised combination of GPUs (graphics processors) and VPUs (video processors) continued to gain traction, stimulating growing interest in the Group’s PowerVR VXD video decoders and VXE encoders alongside GPUs.
Ensigma communications - the Group saw continued growth in interest and licensing for the Group’s multi-standard Ensigma Series3 UCCP DTV solutions, as customers appreciate the value of the technology able to target global multi-standard TVs and STBs.
The on-chip connectivity support in the form of Wi-Fi and other standards continue to interest more customers, looking to integrate such functions for connected consumer audio and multimedia products for home, mobile and automotive use.
Hellosoft V.VoIP and VoLTE - Imagination saw good progress and momentum, including strong engagement in key initial LTE network deployment. It had a positive reception to the new Social Communicator V.VoIP products shown at MWC 2012. These integrate voice and video over IP (V.VoIP) into Facebook and other social media services.
Caustic Professional - good progress was made in the initial engagement in the professional market segment. Technology development and initial delivery are making good progress with the first ray-tracing test chip now manufactured and in use by the development team.
Outlook
The licensing pipeline remains robust. This is expected to result in another good year of growth in licensing revenue, although as ever the timing of deal closures is not always certain.
The royalty volume trend for the full year is in line with the expected range (300m – 320m units) with royalty rates likely to remain at least at the level shown in the first half of the financial year.
Revenue for the financial year from PURE is expected to show a modest improvement on last year, although the environment remains challenging.
The Board remains confident that the Group is on track for continued progress, with the full year results expected to show another good year of growth.
Hossein Yassaie, Imagination’s Chief Executive said:
"The demand for our technologies continues to grow strongly. They are powering the transition in several markets to "smart" devices - in particular phones, tablets, TVs and in cars, where our state-of-the-art multimedia and connectivity offering are key drivers.
"Our strategy to identify and create disruptive technologies is paying off - it is set to continue to fuel further strong progress over the next few years."

New iPad gets PowerVR SGX 543MP4 graphics

Apple announced the new iPad today , with 'quad-core graphics' , in other words, SGX 543MP4.

http://www.apple.com/ipad/features/

presentation:  http://events.apple.com.edgesuite.net/123pibhargjknawdconwecown/event/index.html

In the presentation Tim Cook and others repeatedly mentioned the amazing graphics capability (and improved video output:1080p , courtesy of PowerVR also). It seems like the main point of this iteration is:

1. Killer graphics/video , better than anything competitors can manage for 2012 and much of 2013
2. LTE/4G ready, so competitors like Android and Windows 8 do not have an advantage with connectivity either.

Sadly for Nvidia, Tim Cook was keen to point out the graphics performance of A5X chip was 4X that of Tegra 3 !

Imagination @ MWC 2012

IMG released this excellent update today from MWC Barcelona.
The statement shows the increasing penetration of SGX 544, with Renesas new MP5232 using it, and ST-E with LU8540, U8540 (moving into NovaThor) and A9540 cores (Nova). Of note, the NovaThor series previously used Mali graphics from ARM.
Yesterday Intel announced the Intel Atom Z2580 for high-end (SGX 544 again) and for the low-end Z2000 (SGX 540).
Meanwhile, OMAP 5 (SGX 544 also) has been impressing everyone with real-world tests in which the Tegra 3(quad-core) was given a 'thrashing'.
We have GDC and the IMS, together with an almost certain iPad 3 announcement coming up in the next 3 weeks.

MWC, Barcelona, Spain:  Imagination Technologies Group plc (LSE: IMG, “Imagination”, “the Group”), a leading multimedia and communications technologies company, announces that the first two cores of its new PowerVR Series6 ‘Rogue’ family, G6200 and G6400, are now available and deliver the highest performance for all markets.
Single and multiprocessor PowerVR Series5 SGX GPU solutions empower the most important devices in the latest generation of mobile SoCs being shown at MWC 2012 in Barcelona (IMG’;s stand is at Hall 1, stand 1D45).

Hossein Yassaie, CEO, Imagination says: “As smartphones become the highest volume segment in the phone market, we are driving mobile and embedded graphics performance to reach across the full range of smart mobile consumer devices, from mass market to high end in an era of ubiquitous mobile multimedia.

“Last year at MWC we said that ‘clock for clock PowerVR SGX, which has been shipping in significant volume for several years, outperforms competitive solutions, many of which have yet to ship in any volume.’ That statement remains unchanged a year later. Indeed as SGX MP opens up a wider performance gap in today’s devices PowerVR Series6 is already set to widen that gap even further to unrivalled GFLOPS per mm2 and per mW for all APIs.

“PowerVR has established itself as the developer’s de facto standard across smartphones, tablets, mobile computing and games consoles, attracting an extensive community of adopters and powering iconic and much-loved products. Our partners are now delivering the most comprehensive range of solutions, from low end to high end, that truly can enable any phone or tablet device to have PowerVR, the leading GPU technology.”

Key PowerVR enabled SoC (system on chip) devices at the show include*:

·       Intel Medfield Z2460 incorporating PowerVR SGX GPU and PowerVR VXE and VXD VPU technology.

·       MediaTek MT6575 incorporating PowerVR SGX GPU technology

·       Renesas Mobile MP5232 LTE Triple-Mode Platform incorporating PowerVR SGX544 GPU technology

·       ST-Ericsson LU8540, U8540 and A9540 incorporating PowerVR™ SGX544 GPU technology

·       Texas Instruments Incorporated’s OMAP™ 5 platform, which incorporates dual SGX 544MP GPUs  (Hall 8, #8A84)

Numerous phones and tablets containing Imagination’s technologies are on display across the show.

Says Jeffrey Ju, General Manager of the Smartphone Business Unit at MediaTek: "Following the ongoing success of MT6573, which has opened up exciting opportunities for mass market, high volume smartphone GPU adoption, we are thrilled to have PowerVR graphics acceleration in the new MT6575, and to working with Imagination as a strategic partner going forward."

Says Shinichi Yoshioka, chief operating officer at Renesas Mobile: “Renesas Mobile’s long term partnership with Imagination has led to many firsts in mobile graphics. This year’s MWC will see us both showcasing the ultra-fast and exciting graphics performance of Renesas Mobile triple mode platforms featuring advanced single and multiprocessor PowerVR GPUs. This powerful combination allows us to stay ahead of the pack to deliver compelling use cases and console-like graphics to the emerging worldwide LTE market.”

Teppo Hemia, head of smartphone and tablet platform business and architecture group at ST-Ericsson says: “By using the powerful Imagination PowerVR GPU in our new NovaThor L8450 platform, we will be able to deliver amazing graphics performance at low power consumption. For the NovaThor L8450, we selected the Imagination PowerVR GPU since it delivers the performance we need to meet our customers’ requirements for next generation mobile devices.”

Remi El-Ouazzane, vice president and general manager, OMAP platform business unit, TI says: “TI has been a long-standing partner of Imagination Technologies, yielding a relationship we take very seriously as we collaborate on future mobile processor-driven graphic applications. The company has developed a highly-differentiated GPU architecture that’s gaining incredible momentum within the applications ecosystem. The PowerVR cores leverage unified shading, deferred rendering and more—setting these GPUs ahead of the pack. Inside the OMAP 5 platform, TI is pushing the powerful dual core SGX544MP to its limits. We’re pairing it with our smart multicore architecture to establish a new graphic-driven experience guaranteed to make everyone sit up and take notice.”

Eight of Imagination’s partners, including ST-Ericsson, Texas Instruments, Renesas Electronics and MediaTek are also already committed to developing SoCs utilizing Imagination’s PowerVR Series6 Rogue architecture, the first cores of which, PowerVR G6200 and G6400 are now announced.

Renesas launches MP5232 LTE integrated platform

Another Power VR'd platform for high volume smartphone and tablet markets, this time from long-term partner Renesas. The diagram shows PowerVR SGX graphics and the description is of industry-leading graphics, so SGX543MP seems likely. The past week has revealed in more detail how IMG will dominate the low-mid high volume levels and not just high-end markets:

http://renesasmobile.com/news-events/news/news-20120215-LTE-Triple-Mode-Platform-Optimised-For-Full-Featured-High-Volume-Smartphones.html

TOKYO, Japan, February 15th, 2012— Renesas Electronics Corporation (TSE: 6723) and its subsidiary, Renesas Mobile Corporation, a leading supplier of advanced cellular semiconductor solutions and platforms, today announced the availability of the MP5232, the first single-chip, high-performance, scalable smartphone platform optimised to address the US$150-300 range device market. The MP5232 platform is designed to enable OEMs to accelerate the creation and delivery of high volume LTE/HSPA+ capable smartphones, tablets and mobile Internet devices the industry requires to deliver the full potential of LTE.
The MP5232 platform sets a new benchmark in terms of levels of integration and performance for fully featured high-volume LTE devices. At its heart, the Renesas Mobile modem, deployed in over two billion devices to date, delivers the industry’s highest throughput and low power multi-mode FDD and TDD-LTE Category 4 capabilities. Combined with a state-of-the-art application processor the platform delivers a no-compromise user experience with multi-core computing power, industry-leading graphics, video and imaging capabilities. The platform also includes advanced RF transceivers, power management and audio solutions. This highly integrated smartphone platform is delivered fully tested and certified to enable customers to bring new generations of fully-featured LTE/HSPA+ smartphones to market in as little as six to nine months.
“We are seeing a number of US$600+ LTE super phone devices being launched in the market, but the industry needs a wider penetration of LTE devices for the business case for LTE to pay off,” commented Jean-Marie Rolland, CTO and Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Renesas Mobile Corporation. “The MP5232 platform represents a new category of mobile platform optimised to increase the number of fully-featured, LTE high volume smartphones in the market. By integrating high performing, proven technologies the platform offers a low risk path for device manufacturers to create high volume, premium capability LTE multi-mode products for multiple market segments quickly and effectively, without having to make any compromises in terms of features or user experience.”
"The whole mobile industry is undoubtedly committed to LTE as the technology of choice for 4G services. However, it becomes increasingly challenging adding LTE to an already packed mobile devices that are required to support different legacy modes and bands,” said Malik Saadi, Principal Analyst, Informa Telecoms and Media. “In order to achieve global economies, vendors are keen to offer LTE multiband and multimode devices capable of roaming across different networks and regions, without compromising price, user experience, form factor, or power consumption.”
Renesas Mobile has brought its extensive consumer electronics industry expertise to the development of the platform, ensuring that the MP5232 benefits from the latest process technologies, methodologies and multimedia capabilities. The resulting platform is smarter by design with the lowest possible platform cost compared to current generation chipsets and an extremely high level of integration. In addition, the platform benefits from a unique modem architecture designed to consume the lowest possible power. Scalability and flexibility are baked in, allowing OEMs to create devices that address multiple price points and segments with minimal development time and maximum hardware and software reuse. Certified and proven technologies ensure that development, certification and maintenance costs are reduced.
Based on the Renesas Mobile’s state-of-the-art application processor technology, the MP5232 platform delivers a no-compromise user experience with 1.5GHz dual-core computing power, industry-leading graphics, video and imaging capabilities. The platform supports differentiating features including multi-camera and multi-display support, full HD 1080p multi-format video encoding/decoding, stereoscopic 3D (S3D) video and advanced graphics to deliver a console-like gaming experiences and engaging user interfaces.
Renesas Mobile consulting and support services leverage the company’s extensive system and production expertise to provide assistance at all stages of implementation, from design through to production. This support significantly reduces not only development time, but also production tuning and test time.

Availability

Samples of the MP5232 platform are available Q1 2012 to lead OEM’s in the form of reference designs together with supporting documentation, software and hardware. Pricing is available on request.
END

Mediatek launches MT6575 Android Platform

With just over 2 weeks to go until Mobile World Congress 2012, Mediatek today announced the MT6575 platform for entry to mid-level smartphones. The target here is Qualcomm's MSM7227A platform which currently reigns in the Chinese market.
It became clear last year that Mediatek would become a significant source of royalty volume for IMG (see earlier posts) - looks like circa. 50m royalty volume for this calendar year. Hopefully Mediatek will also come out with an Android tablet platform based on IMG soon.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/mediatek-launches-mt6575-android-platform-2012-02-13

HSINCHU, Taiwan, Feb. 13, 2012 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- MediaTek Inc., a leading fabless semiconductor company for wireless communications and digital multimedia solutions, today announced the availability of the MT6575, its 3rd generation platform for entry to mid-level Android smartphones. The MT6575 platform offers a 1GHz ARM® Cortex(TM)-A9 processor, a proven 3G/HSPA modem and runs the latest "Ice-Cream Sandwich" Android 4.0 release.

"We expect significant growth in entry and mid-level smartphones, with wholesale prices under US$190, over the coming years. We forecast that this segment will almost triple in size from 191 million shipments in 2012 to 551 million by 2016. At that time, we also expect approximately 75% of those entry and mid-level smartphones to ship to emerging markets," said Neil Mawston, Executive Director, Global Wireless Practice, at Strategy Analytics. The MediaTek MT6575 platform is ideally suited to cater to a wide range of smartphone devices that target this growing segment in multiple markets around the world.

"Leveraging the energy-efficient, high-performance Cortex(TM)-A9 processor in Android smartphone applications is an extremely compelling proposition and a great proof point for the scalability of the ARM architecture. During 2011 the Cortex(TM)-A9 processor has powered many of the most up-to-date and highest performance smartphones. The proliferation of Cortex-A Series processors into lower cost, mainstream mobile devices will deliver a significant uplift in the user experience," said Laurence Bryant, Director of Mobile, ARM.

For mid-range smartphones, the MT6575 platform supports 720p high-definition video playback and recording with an 8MP camera and qHD (960x540) high-resolution displays via a PowerVRTM SGX Series5 GPU (graphics processing unit) from Imagination Technologies. In industry-standard benchmark testing, the MT6575 offered over 35% improvement for browser applications and over 20% improvement in graphics capabilities for gaming when compared to competitors' best offerings in these segments.

Additionally, the MT6575 platform provides built-in support for advanced features such as integrated capabilities to drive 3D displays and proprietary algorithms for mobile display picture processing. In sum, the MT6575 provides DTV-grade picture quality on a smartphone by leveraging MediaTek's proven technology as a world-leading DTV platform provider.

The MT6575 platform also supports entry-level smartphones with smaller display sizes, lower resolution, less memory and reduced multimedia requirements.

In addition, the MT6575 boasts the world's lowest power consumption and most comprehensive integration of hot swap dual-SIM capability compatible with the Android platform. With the MT6575 dual-SIM solution, consumers will no longer have to worry about dropped calls while active data transfer is happening on either SIM card, and will experience automatic resumption of data exchange once calls on the other SIM card have ended, in addition, with the hot swap feature enabled, the SIM card can be inserted without switching off the mobile.

The 3G/HSPA modem integrated in the MT6575 platform has been qualified at major 3G operators world-wide.

The MT6575, delivered in 40nm CMOS technology, builds on the proven track record of the 2nd generation MT6573 platform -- i.e., the platform that powers the Lenovo A60, China Unicom's top selling handset in the sub-RMB 1000 (approx. US$160) smartphone category.

"We are very excited by the prospects of the MT6575 platform. It combines MediaTek's innovative chipset technology with our proven reference design and complete software solution model. We believe this platform is ideally suited to enable our customers to address entry to mid-level smartphone cost and performance needs on a global basis -- today and tomorrow," said Ching-Jiang Hsieh, President of MediaTek.

The MT6575 is currently being incorporated into the latest smartphone offerings by many of MediaTek's leading customers and the first smartphone models based on this new platform will hit the market in the first quarter of 2012.

Apple Q1

A day after TI confirmed OMAP was going great guns, Apple produced yet another blow-out quarter. Channel checks and operator activation numbers had indicated very strong iPhone 4S numbers but no-one predicted the magnitude of sales would be so great:

iPhone 37m
iPad 15.4m
iPod 15.4m (>50% Touch as usual)
even the Apple TV (hobby) managed 1.4m.

If you add in Apple's 2011 Q3 and Q4 shipments we get the following running total from April 2011 onwards :

iPhone: 74.1m
iPad: 35.7m
iPod Touch: approx 15m
Apple TV: approx 3m
(plus some contribution from iPod Nano at smaller asp)

Giving a total of approx 127m devices .  IMG's FY also starts 1st May, so that has to be factored in. IMG's total royalty volume was 123m in H1, so that puts it in perspective. HY talked about a 'substantial acceleration' in royalty volume in H2 and here it is.
The momentum in Q2 will continue as the China launch for iPhone 4S was in January and demand is 'off the charts'.
Many analysts had predicted iPad 2 volume was dropping off but it never materialised.
Another source of  HY's 'substantial acceleration' is the Kindle Fire (also IMG'd via OMAP), so it will be interesting to see the numbers on that device (Amazon report next Tuesday).

Full transcript of the CC:

http://seekingalpha.com/article/321818-apple-s-ceo-discusses-q1-2012-results-earnings-call-transcript?part=qanda

Intel Q4

The results season for IMG's main partners is under way, starting with Intel Q4 last night.
We scrutinise this , not for the volume numbers (small fry at present via Cedartrail/Oaktrail etc) but for indicators of Intel's ambitions,strategy and commitment to IMG-related areas (ie. mobile). There has been a lot of interesting debate on forums/techsites on whether Intel have made a 'solid start' with Medfield (especially after the Anand analysis) or is just another false dawn. I am firmly in the 'Intel will succeed because they have to' camp. There is no option for them, and in Mike Bell they have a leader with 'carte blanche' to tap into all of Intel's resources in a co-ordinated manner and take whatever/whoever he needs (it is almost Apple-like no ?) from anywhere, in order to succeed.
Excerpts from Intel Q4 CC (courtesy of www.seekingalpha.com)

Otellini:

In addition to the Lenovo K800, we announced the Medfield-based smartphone reference design that boasts a sleek form factor, 8 hours of talk time, 6 hours of 1080p video playback and 14 days of standby power, clearly demonstrating the low-power, high-performance capabilities of Intel architecture. Yet as the performance of this device that really showcases what's possible when you combine advanced process technology and the world's most popular computer architecture. Though Medfield is our very first smartphone SoC, independent testers appointed to benchmarks to place Medfield reference design among the very best in the markets.

It was this differentiated performance and exceptional roadmap and exciting new usage models that led to our multiyear, multi-device strategic relationship with Motorola Mobility. The first of these Intel architecture-based devices will go through carrier certification this summer with commercial availability shortly thereafter. And while the Lenovo and Motorola designs are exciting first steps, we're not done making announcements in the smartphone space.

Otellini:

In tablets, I think we'll be able to do that from day one, as you see the Android tablets coming out and Windows 8 tablets coming out. And you'll see us well-positioned in multiple price point on those. And who knows where those prices go over time, but our intention would be to use the advanced silicon integration capability we have to be able to drive the build material cost down, integration up in tablet space, which I think is going to be a sweet spot for Intel. On phones, our strategy is a little bit different. We're coming in at the top of the smartphone market. Our value proposition initially is aimed at best performance and very competitive feature sets and very good battery life. Over -- and then let me say on the other end of the market, the Infineon acquisition has given us a very strong position in basic phones and feature phones. They shipped 400 million modems this year into the cell phone business. So over time, what we'll want to do is grow that capability up by integrating the apps processor and the comm processors onto the same chip, while we drive our initial positions in apps processors from the top down.

Otellini:

Well, actually, they were about where I thought they would be, but I was well below what many of you had. I think the thing is, tablets are a little bit about hardware and an awful lot about software. And I think that until you get to Ice Cream Sandwich, the offering isn't as powerful as what's out there with Apple. And as the Ice Cream Sandwich tablets start shipping, I think you'll start seeing a little bit better receptivity, Google just added the music store, the videos are better, everything got a little bit better bit ICS. And so I think the better test is year 2 here, in terms of is there anyone that can compete with the iPad? And then the other part of that test, of course, is the Windows 8 tablets that are being queued up for production. So I don't know that the whole tablet thing is settled down by any stretch, and I do have a lot of interest in, if you heard me at CES about these hybrid and convertible designs as they apply to clamshells, where there's a significant blurring between what people do with tablets and what people do with PCs. So the jury is out on I think the long-term segmentation by form factor. But I do think you'll see more progress on the Android side as a result of ICS.

Otellini:

 I did not say, I want to be very clear, I did not say that our intent would be to integrate Medfield to baseband. I said over time, you'll see us move from the low-end baseband-only business in the feature phones and value phones to having it a more integrated capability. I didn't say when and what generation. I'm really not at liberty to discuss that. But the major thrust over the next year or 2 is going to be to have very high-performance modems as a comps processor and the best-of-class apps processors for smartphones.

END

Next week we have TI and of course Apple to look forward to.