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AMD 203.14-0.8%Jan 9 9:30 AM EST
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To: neolib who wrote (31314)7/28/2019 4:49:11 PM
From: frmrVZguyRead Replies (1) of 73511
 
RE Modem staffing. XMM and Picochip are two entirely separate groups originating from different countries. The technology and fab nodes are also driven separately. And Picochip is NOT downsizing, it is reaching for greater market share after launching with RAKUTEN of Japan for an Single-Mode LTE-only network using open source tech based on Intel base stations using Picochip and servers using Xeon.

Since XMM was the child of Infineon Wireless with offices in Dresden and Munich and more recently staff was added in Austin and Tempe... whew.... and it has been prominent in the news due to winning iPhone sockets.... you are up-to-speed on its staffing and locations and more familiar with that recent news. But first you must accept that XMM originated as an GSM and WCDMA tech solution heavily reliant on ERIC IP before adding 4G LTE from an IP tech shop named Blue Wonder and later adding more IP from an Egyptian IP company whose name I don't recall at this moment. But none of that solved the problem of designing an SoC. XMM remained a stand-alone modem.

What many won't be familiar with is the industrial Base Station and Small Cell Network SoC product named Picochip which was born from the former Motorola division named Freescale. That company is located in Chandler AZ just a couple blocks from Intel, Chandler. Think of it as a competitor to the QCOM Atheron division and not to MDM modems nor Snapdragon. Intel bought it in January 2014 when MA/COM bought the owner of Picochip and immediately sold Picochip, keeping the other products.

And all of those are just a couple miles down the same road from Intel's 2013 M&A of Fujitsu Semiconductor Wireless Products who are the designers of the world-famous FIRST multi-mode, multi-band, world band 2/3/4G solution that INCLUDED TDD-LTE and therefore is the WORLD FIRST Western-designed such solution to be certified in a PRC Cellco network: China Mobile.

The reason I know all of that is that I am an owner of one of the JV designers of that multi-chip SiP solution: SEQUANS S.A.

Now time has passed and ^that^ tech is obsolete now as new SoCs that make the 9-year-old SiP above look like an old Apollo moon-launch tech. But in 2011-2 it was the very latest and arguably more advanced than anything from Qualcomm.

^THAT^ is why Intel bought it in August-ish 2013 after discovering XMM failed in 2012.

So, the smartphone and IoT modems groups are scattered in several locations globally and Picochip SoC is in AZ near one of the XMM offices.

Picochip also has JV offices in PRC because Intel moved Network design to PRC in a very loudly announced move by Brian Krzanich to JV its IoT efforts there as a response to the "Four Sins" letter from PRC to Qualcomm accusing them of Colonialism. Intel launched what I characterized as its "Better Angels" response by being very generous with tech IP and JV investments in PRC.

FINAL SUMMARY: given all of that, I'm not surprised they don't try to get into details about Picochip because it would open up a whole new can of questions about sunk costs and IP and Network Security.

After all, if Huawei is insecure because its designed in PRC, then so Picochip-based Network hardware could also be at risk of security flaw concerns having been designed and built there.

But then again Alcatel has built telephone switching hardware in PRC since it was Bell Labs Division. Now of course its Nokia. Soooo.... its complicated.

^THAT^ would be an awkward conversation. And Picochip is growing, not shrinking.
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