Transmeta's future may not be in the chips
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LAS VEGAS -- Later this month, Transmeta will announce the results of an internal evaluation of its business model that could signal the company's gradual exit from microprocessor sales.
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InfoWorld - Via Technologies is not likely to ship its supersmallÂ Mobile ITX motherboard, aimed at ultramobile PCs (UMPCs) and other light portable devices, in production volume until next year, company officials said here at the CES show Monday.
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The company that put power consumption on the map is thinking of getting out of the expensive business of making chips.
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The four companies developing the Cell microprocessor released a few more details about the chip on Monday -- and with them a surprise: first generation versions of the device won't be built on a cutting edge production technology into which the companies have sunk billions of dollars, but on a technology already in widespread use today.
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Emisphere warrants close attention, although massive profits are not in the near-term cards.
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Big Blue will use AMD's chip in a high-performance server but isn't yet planning a general-purpose Opteron system.
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When Morris Chang, the founder of the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, speaks of the future of the chip business, he sounds somber.
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Advanced Micro DevicesÂ is investing $7.5 million in energy-efficient chip company Transmeta, which has beenÂ battling falling revenueÂ and widening losses.
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The company that years ago set out to become a legitimate alternative to Intel, and blazed the trail that AMD eventually followed, today announced it is setting aside its patent infringement claim against Intel. The companies have reached an out-of-court settlement granting Intel perpetual license to Transmeta's CPU power management technology, in exchange for $150 million in cash up front and $100 million more over the next five years.
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Perhaps the decision to name its flagship product after a fictional shipwrecked traveler who spent almost 30 years trapped on a small island was not the best of omens for Transmeta Corp.
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In the long term, the device will reshape mobile telephony.  But in the shorter term, don't expect upheaval.
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TRANSMETA HAS started shipping limited quantities of its X86 compatible Efficeon TM8800 processor, a low-powered CPU fabbed on 90-nanometre silicon.
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Despite Intel's support of the emerging wireless technology, some doubt its potential.
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The chip maker reorganizes around platforms. Will it make a difference?
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With Intel Corp. apparently poised to announce the latest stage of its restructuring effort, speculation has centered not on whether the world's largest chip maker would be cutting jobs, but on how many.
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PMC-Sierra Inc. warned Wall Street third-quarter revenues won&#39;t meet expectations, but that wasn&#39;t enough to persuade investors to pull out of the beleaguered chip sector.
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Via Technologies is not likely to ship its supersmall&#160;Mobile ITX motherboard, aimed at ultramobile PCs (UMPCs) and other light portable devices, in production volume until next year, company officials said here at the CES show Monday.The company attracted industry attention when it unveiled the board at Computex in Taipei last June, declaring that it would find its way into markets this year.But &quot;manufacturability issues&quot; will likely prevent the board from being used in commercially launched devices this year, according to Alp Sezen, a sales director for Via based in Fremont, California. Via expects to announce the Mobile ITX production schedule at this year&#39;s Computex, and will probably just manage to ship sample boards by the end of the fourth quarter, he said.&quot;It&#39;s normal to take about a year between announcing a board to production,&quot; he said. He acknowledged, however, that ultimately in the case of the Mobile ITX, the time between its unveiling and production is going to be more than 18 months.Like prototypes running last year, current Mobile ITX boards use 1GHZ CZ-M ULV (ultra low voltage processors) and CX700 chip sets. The board measures 7.5 centimeters by 4.5 cm -- smaller than a credit card -- and to get it that small, the spaces between the pins underneath the processor need to be shrunk to 0.5 millimeters from the current 1.0 millimeters in the company&#39;s current Pico ITX board, Sezen said.It&#39;s not easy to do this and ensure more than 90 percent of the boards coming off production lines are error free, Sezen said.Chip packaging technology needs to improve, he added. Via is a fabless chip developer and, on its own, faces difficulties developing new, cost-effective packaging technologies.In a sense, Via is dependent on Intel ramping up volume of new generation, 45-nanometer process chips. As Intel does so, new surface-mount technology for chips will be developed that can also be used to manufacture the Via Mobile ITX boards.Although the Mobile ITX is not likely to appear in UMPCs and other light portable devices until next year, the reduced package chip set incorporated into the board will likely be used in com modules for embedded systems by the end of this year, Sezen said. A manufacturer for these embedded systems is likely to make a public announcement this month, he said.Some would-be makers of new lightweight mobile devices, however, are chomping at the bit to get their hands on the new Via board. The MTube project, a research and development project sponsored by the Taiwan government&#39;s Science and Technology Group (STAG), was showing off a Linux-based, prototype Mobile Internet Device (MID) that incorporates the Mobile ITX board and measures 3.3 by 3.3 by 0.8 inches. It sported a 2.8-inch VGA touch screen and supports full rate video playback.The project wants to spin off from STAG and deliver a commercially available product as soon as it can get its hands on a motherboad with the specs that would make it viable, according to H.T. Kung, the project&#39;s advisor. However, to date, neither Via nor Intel could promise to deliver a commercially usable board within that timeframe, he said.&#160;