Alchemy conjuring low-power cores
Apr. 29, 2000 (Electronic Buyers News - CMP via COMTEX) -- A fabless start-up
spun out of Cadence Design Systems Inc. plans to push the MIPS processor
architecture into the low-power personal-communications space dominated by
ARM-based designs.
Led by former executives from Advanced Micro Devices, Cirrus Logic, and
Motorola, Alchemy Semiconductor Inc. will rely on the former Digital Equipment
Corp. design team that helped create the Alpha and StrongARM processors. The
company plans to manufacture its first product by early next year.
Alchemy was formed last year using seed money from Cadence, San Jose, and today
will announce a $15 million financing round with investments from
venture-capital firms Austin Ventures, Telos Ventures, and US Venture Partners.
The Austin, Texas, company has licensed the 32-bit MIPS architecture from MIPS
Technologies Inc., and is developing a high-performance, low-power core that
will include specific peripheral functions aimed at what Alchemy calls the
"Internet-edge device" market. The company has engaged Taiwan Semiconductor
Manufacturing Co. Ltd. as its foundry partner.
Alchemy plans to sample its initial device this fall. Device specifications are
scheduled to be presented at the Embedded Processor Forum in San Jose in June.
The offering will include such peripherals as a multiply and accumulate unit and
Ethernet and DMA controllers.
The device will be performance-competitive with existing processors such as
Motorola's 68K/ColdFire and PowerPC, but will offer lower power dissipation,
said John Peskuric, director of product marketing. "The MIPS road map is along
266-, 350-, 400-MHZ designs, but those devices are all [delivering] 3 to 5 W [of
power dissipation]," he said. "We're targeting half-W and below, which will
allow us to get into the handheld, battery-powered applications coming into
existence."
Alchemy says its offering will initially be used in applications like Internet
gateways, firewalls, routers, and mixers, but the goal is emerging PDA and
Internet-enabled portable devices.
Keith Diefendorff, an analyst at MicroDesign Resources, Sebastopol, Calif., said
moving the MIPS architecture into low-power applications could prove successful.
"There's nothing inherent about the ARM architecture that has allowed it to be
low power," he said. "Low power is about good engineering and good circuit
design. It's not about the instruction set. MIPS, as an embedded core, is very
popular and well supported by design tools. I think there are definitely a lot
of people who, given a low-power MIPS alternative, would take it."
Alchemy's president and chief executive, Eric Broockman, is a former vice
president and general manager of Cirrus Logic's Crystal Semiconductor division,
and was a senior engineer at IBM Corp.
Other co-founders include Greg Hoeppner, vice president of engineering, who was
involved in developing Digital's Alpha and StrongARM families; Phil Pompa, vice
president of sales and marketing, who helped market AMD's 29K architecture and
the PowerPC at Motorola; and Rick Witek, chief technical officer, the
co-architect of Alpha and a developer of the ARM and PowerPC processors.
Other founders are Jim Montanaro, engineering director, who helped design the
first two Alpha processors and Strong-ARM; Richard Reis, engineering director,
who worked on Motorola's 68000 and 88000 processors and helped Cyrix Corp.
develop its X86 processors; and Ray Stephany, engineering director, who also
assisted in developing the Alpha and StrongARM processors.
"These people have built a lot of relationships throughout the industry,"
Peskuric said, adding that Alchemy is working with several undisclosed customers
and has the potential for fast growth.
"We have plans for an IPO as soon as we possibly can; and if you're going to do
an IPO, you need to show you can get over $100 million," he said. "Ten years
ago, it was difficult to compete with a Motorola, IBM, or Intel. Customers
didn't trust you could get capacity and provide the support. The foundry
capacity out there now, the network of support [for] the MIPS architecture, and
the financial backing we have in place leaves us feeling very comfortable about
having a good business."
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