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Technology Stocks : Qualcomm Moderated Thread - please read rules before posting -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Art Bechhoefer who wrote (108550)	1/10/2012 3:31:35 PM
From: DanD	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 197216

"Finally, remember that an Intel processor is also contained in the most popular current version of an ultrabook -- the MacBook Air." This has much more to do with software than hardware.

To: Art Bechhoefer who wrote (108550)	1/10/2012 9:35:04 PM
From: pheilman_	7 Recommendations Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 197216

Intel vs QCOM Intel has the most profitable processor architecture. To paraphrase a microprocessor speaker, all other processors, no matter how powerful, are only worth $25. (It was a long time ago) In contrast Intel architecture parts go up into the hundreds of dollars. Maybe an order of magnitude higher value per square mm of silicon. Ah, but when Intel tries to make any other product the choice to divert any fab capacity cannot be justified. And all the rest of the electrical engineering world gets it. If you design in any of Intel's various new ventures, you're screwed, because they are very likely to stop making because it doesn't make enough profit per mm of silicon. Intel's architecture is not power efficient and the future runs on batteries. QCOM has always made an architecture for battery power and is now expanding into Intel's space. Batteries do not scale, they are improving only very slowly. Efficiency will be important.

To: Art Bechhoefer who wrote (108550)	1/10/2012 10:00:49 PM
From: neolib	5 Recommendations Respond to of 197216

If you have more specific ideas, I'm sure we'd all like to hear them. OEM's who use Qualcomm devices are selecting from an ecosystem of many suppliers, including the ability, like Apple or Samsung, to customize their own SOCs if they so desire. There is a level of compatibility, and engineering design expertise that is common to this ecosystem. The multiple vendors (even though the SOC's might be unique) assures competitive pricing. Just look at how Apple is looking at TSMC vs Samsung. Intel will be unique (aside perhaps from some competition from AMD) in offering a non-compatible ecosystem of x86. They have a very long history of wanting high prices for their solutions, because they have effectively had monopoly power. Why would OEM's choose Intel solutions given such a history? The issues are more business than technical. Intel (and all the ARM players as well) are going to suffer very rapidly the same problem that has hit the PC business: Chip performance has largely outstripped user needs due to lack of software innovation. The mobile sector brought exactly this sort of software innovation, but starting on hardware with significantly lower performance than current PC CPUs. The early smartphone and tablet SOCs would not have any value in the PC sector because their absolute performance was so low. But the software was tailored to that, and enabled innovative user capabilities despite the lower absolute hardware performance. The rate of innovation in the ARM SOC world is progressing much more quickly than even the x86 rate, and as we get faster and more cores in ARM SOCs they will also get to the point quite quickly where the average user experience on mobile gadgets is no longer benefiting from the increased performance, UNLESS compelling software can help things out. Fundamentally, innovation in mobile gadgets is being done by Apple and Google and all the apps developers, not so much by the CPU designers. Intel was used to the PC sector where Dell, HP, etc, didn't do much in the way of innovation anymore, having ceded that to Intel. Intel was happy with that in the PC space. Look at Intel's PC CPU margins vs its OEM partners margins in the consumer PC space, then think of Apple's margins in the consumer section. Even Intel's copying of Macbook Airs is designed primarily to keep Intel's margins high, it won't help its OEM partners much, especially since Intel has held the line at wacking the CPU prices in Ultrabooks and instead left it to the OEM's to squeeze the price lower to attract customers. Its good for Intel, but nobody else. OEM's who are awake can ask themselves what the business model with Intel predicts for them. Will it result in them getting Apple's margins, or will it simply give Intel good margins and leave them with what??