Transmeta article... Intel concerned???
>>January 20, 2000
Transmeta Unveils Chip Aimed
At Portable, Handheld Machines
By DEAN TAKAHASHI
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Transmeta Corp., a heretofore secretive Silicon Valley start-up, posed a challenge to Intel Corp. by unveiling a microprocessor chip for portable computers and handheld "information appliances."
David Ditzel, Transmeta's chief executive, told a crowd of 200 reporters and analysts that its line of chips, the "Crusoe" family, will run a range of operating-system software including Microsoft Corp.'s Windows and the free Linux system. "We're creating a whole new category of computing," Mr. Ditzel said.
Intel has faced similar challenges during the past two decades from a string of companies. Most such efforts have failed, although a few companies, most notably Advanced Micro Devices Inc., have held on to small fractions of the market.
Still, Transmeta (www.transmeta.com), Santa Clara, Calif., poses a credible threat to Intel, said Keith Dieffendorff, an analyst at Micro Design Resources Inc., Sunnyvale, Calif., because it designed a chip specifically to run on low power -- an important feature requirement for mobile computers. An Intel official declined to comment.
Transmeta has been closely watched as much for its people and its backers as for its technology. Mr. Ditzel was once a prominent executive at Sun Microsystems Inc., Palo Alto, Calif., Linus Torvalds, creator of Linux, is Transmeta's software programmer. Investors include prominent venture-capital funds and institutions such as Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen's Vulcan Ventures Inc., Soros Fund Management LLC, Deutsche Bank AG, Walden Group, Institutional Venture Partners and Integrated Capital Partners. Transmeta has raised more than $100 million, Mr. Ditzel said.
Transmeta's chip is unique in its combination of hardware and software. The Crusoe chips can take Windows or Linux programs and translate them into an internal code the chip can process at fast speeds. Linley Gwennap, an analyst at the Linley Group in Mountain View, Calif., said the translation slows the chip somewhat; Transmeta acknowledges that a 700-megahertz Crusoe chip offers the same software performance as a 500-megahertz Intel Pentium III chip.
However, the translation feature has benefits. It lets the chip run any operating system and a user easily can switch between operating systems, Transmeta says. The company will focus on Windows and Linux first, Mr. Ditzel said. But other software, such as Sun Microsystems' Java, could also run on the chip, he said.
The Crusoe chips are smaller than Intel's because they don't have circuitry associated with Intel's specific architecture built into them, Transmeta said. With the small size comes lower costs and smaller power usage, the company said. It can operate a laptop computer for weeks at a time in a "sleep mode" and double the typical battery life, without the need for costly cooling systems, Mr. Ditzel said.
Transmeta's customers are expected to include numerous computer makers. S3 Inc., a Santa Clara, Calif., graphics chip and PC-accessory maker, is expected to announce Thursday it will make a "Web pad," an Internet appliance that uses a 400-megahertz Crusoe chip and runs Linux. Transmeta also will have a 700-megahertz chip for ultralight-notebook computers coming out midyear.
International Business Machines Corp. will make the chips under contract for Transmeta. Terms of the contract weren't released. Besides bringing a well-honed chip-making operation, IBM also offers the small company an important legal shelter against Intel because it has a patent cross-licensing agreement with Intel.
Mr. Ditzel said the chip line is named after Robinson Crusoe; he liked the name's connotations of "adventure, travel and mobility," he said.
Transmeta "lives up to the buzz," said Mark Edelstone, an analyst at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. "Now we have to wait and see if they really deliver."<<
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