FredE, the BRCM press release sounds good but it's vapor thin on details. Here are some details about some of its other cool chips:
eetimes.com
There are other network chips out there:
eetimes.com
Check this out too:
Broadcom looks to license technology
from DSP Group
A service of Semiconductor Business News, CMP Media Inc.
Story posted 9 a.m. EST/6 a.m., PST, 8/16/99
By Mark LaPedus and Darrell Dunn Electronic Buyers' News
IRVINE,Calif. -- Continuing to build its vast portfolio of intellectual
property in the communications-IC market, Broadcom Corp. here last
week struck two deals, including a major partnership with the DSP
Group Inc. that sources said will give the chip maker key DSP
technology.
Under the terms of the deal, Broadcom will license the DSP Group's,
family of DSP cores, according to several industry sources. In return,
Broadcom will get a much-needed programmable DSP for use in
broadband communications and related applications, sources added.
However, it still remains unclear as to which broadband applications
Broadcom will apply the DSP technology.
Officials from Broadcom declined to comment on the deal. Tim
Menasveta, software application manager for the Santa Clara,
Calif.-based DSP Group, said in an interview last week that the
company has licensed its DSP technology "to a major cable
set-top-box provider, but we can't disclose the company as yet."
The reported licensing arrangement with the DSP Group, to be
announced in the next few weeks, follows another major
announcement by Broadcom. Early last week, the chip maker said it
will purchase AltoCom Inc., a Mountain View, Calif.-based supplier
of software-modem technology, for $170 million in stock.
The acquisition-Broadcom's sixth significant alliance since the
beginning of the year-is part of the company's strategy to become a
one-stop shop for communications-IC products. With the DSP Group,
though, Broadcom hopes to broaden its DSP portfolio in a much
bigger and bolder way.
"There's no doubt about it," said Will Strauss, an analyst at Forward
Concepts in Tempe, Ariz. "[Broadcom] is going up against of Lucent,
TI, and Conexant in this [DSP] space."
Indeed, Broadcom's efforts to beef up its DSP portfolio could put it on
par with powerhouses such as Analog Devices, Conexant, Lucent,
Motorola, and Texas Instruments, all of which are leveraging their
respective DSP technologies to develop innovative products in the
communications-IC sector.
However, it does not appear that Broadcom will move into the
merchant DSP-chip market; instead, it will leverage its DSP
capabilities to gain an edge over its competitors in some emerging
applications, analysts said.
"Voice-over-IP is going to run over DSPs, and the nature of voice,
especially in the early stages of this market, require that if you're
going to put something in the field, you need to be able to change it as
standards evolve, and that's programmable DSPs," said Shannon
Pleasant, an analyst with the In-Stat Group in Scottsdale, Ariz.
Although Broadcom has its own DSP technology designed into its
cable-modem ICs, LAN/WAN chips, and other products, the
company is looking for alternate solutions that will help it secure its
place in other sectors of the broadband market.
Broadcom is the leading supplier of chips for cable modems, which
manufacturers promise will transport data at speeds of up to 8
Mbits/s. But this broadband technology has experienced an
assortment of problems in the field. End users, in some cases, have
complained about the sluggish access speeds of their cable-modem
products, not to mention poor service from their providers.
Problems also exist with a competitive broadband technology called
DSL (digital subscriber line), which delivers data over phone lines.
Broadcom does not play in the mainstream DSL-chip market. But it
sells chips for an embryonic, high-end technology called
very-high-bit-rate DSL (VDSL), which delivers data at 52 Mbits/s
over a fiber network.
Broadcom's purchase of AltoCom last week put the chip maker in
another modem-chip market: analog-based software modems, a
promising technology said to be more viable and less expensive than
traditional chip-level products.
Soft modems use ASIC-like devices to enable a PC or other system
to obtain a modem connection in software, rather than hardware,
saving system-component costs. But critics charge that the software
technology can tax the host processor as it executes other operations
in the system.
One of the emerging players in the business, AltoCom's
software-modem products have been embedded into a wide range of
hardware platforms such as handheld devices from Compaq,
Samsung, and Sharp, as well as an Internet-access, WebTV-like
system from Philips. AltoCom's soft-modem products also run on a
number of host CISC and RISC processors, including x86 chips,
StrongARM, and MIPS, as well as on TI's DSP lines.
"The deal with AltoCom ties everything together on the network,"
Forward Concepts' Strauss said. "In fact, Broadcom is building
themselves a mini-empire-they're a force to be reckoned with." |
