Chapter 258 Self-developed Chip
Qualcomm is a company that all mobile phone manufacturers cannot avoid.
Relying on 3G and 4G patents, you can easily extract the "Qualcomm tax" from all smartphones in the world with a wave of your hand and charge it based on the price of the whole machine.
It can be said that even if Qualcomm is lying around doing nothing, there will be a steady stream of rent coming in, and it will be a life of a private renter.
In addition to the ‘Qualcomm tax’, Qualcomm itself also has unique achievements in the chip field. Relying on the architecture authorized by ARM, it has begun to officially launch the ‘Snapdragon’ series of chips.
In fact, many people have rarely heard of Qualcomm chips in the past, and the most famous name in the chip field is Intel.
This is also true. Intel's X86 has an overwhelming advantage in personal computers and servers. The computing power of a single chip can exceed that of ARM architecture chips by dozens of times.
But because of this, the power consumption and heat generation of the X86 chip are astonishing. To put it bluntly, the power consumption and heat dissipation are exaggerated, which is definitely a fatal problem for mobile terminals.
Think about how big a personal computer CPU radiator is. Even a laptop radiator is enough to turn a mobile phone into a brick.
And this can just be made up for by the ARM architecture.
In addition, there were problems with Intel's own strategic direction, which led to the direct loss of the market in the field of smartphone chips.
Qualcomm has seized this opportunity and begun to step into it. It can be regarded as a representative of the company that has tasted the sweetness of the smartphone era.
In the previous generation of Qualcomm's first quad-core processor, the 28nm process APQ8064 processor even surpassed the processor on Fruit 5 in terms of pure running performance.
Last year, Qualcomm also officially launched the Snapdragon series of processors, but they were stabilized by Fruit's self-developed 64-bit A7 dual-core processor. Although the Snapdragon 800 series has four cores, it requires all four cores to be fully turned on to be able to compete with Fruit's A7 dual-core processor. processor.
After learning from the experience, Qualcomm, which had not yet developed its own 64-bit architecture, began to radically enter it by relying on the ARM public version of the 64-bit architecture. Although it used a more advanced 20nm process, the products it produced had a "fire dragon" quality. The title of Snapdragon 810.
The processor has very high temperature requirements. Too high a temperature will affect the performance of the processor itself. For example, Intel even chooses to pour liquid helium in the extreme test environment of processor performance!
Many materials can become superconducting under liquid helium...
Because of the extremely poor heat generation of Snapdragon 810, its actual performance at high temperatures is not even as good as its previous generation processor, and it is even beaten by the upcoming Fruit 6 self-developed A8 processor.
In fact, the processor used in Umbrella's mobile phones is Qualcomm's last year's version of Snapdragon 801, which is chosen in order to have sufficient quantity. In terms of performance alone, it is almost the same as Hanwei's Kirin 930.
For the temporary purchase of processors, only Qualcomm is easier to get.
However, Qualcomm has just excitedly announced the release of the Snapdragon 810, the first 64-bit quad-core chip, which is in the limelight. Almost all of its production capacity is devoted to the Snapdragon 810, even leading to the We can also see new phones with Snapdragon 810.
There is indeed some disdain for Umbrella's order.
There are friends who have cooperated well in the past, and the fab's output is only so much, and they don't produce much!
Although Umbrella has said hello to Four Star and can help with OEM work, Qualcomm is not a marionette and has its own ideas.
"Oh, I'm still staring at the previous generation of chips. Umbrella is really stingy. The price is comparable to that of fruit."
After a salesperson hung up the call from Umbrella, he couldn't help but talk to his colleagues with a little teasing.
“But other performance aspects of their mobile phones are very good.”
"So what if other aspects are good? This is a mobile phone after all, the processor is the heart, and they also have to pay us patent fees."
"That's right, no mobile phone manufacturer can bypass us..."
Not only were Qualcomm's salesmen chatting about this young man who had just entered the mobile phone field, there were also discussions in Qualcomm's senior offices.
"Don't you want to sue?"
The CEO looked at some reports casually. In their eyes, new mobile phone manufacturers are fat.
However, similar to Fruit, where you have to wait until they sue before paying, Qualcomm is also quite a headache.
"No, they handed it in, and the information has actually been sent to you by email."
"Well, their financial statements have not been made public? Who knows if they have submitted less? Inform them that they must be treated equally with other manufacturers."
"They are not listed, this is Umbrella."
"What happened to Umbrella? They have to be reasonable, they..."
But in the end, Qualcomm CEO softened his tone
"Have a nice attitude and remind me tactfully."
"They also want to buy chips."
"Sell, we still have quite a lot of Snapdragon 810 production capacity."
"What they want is 801. The production capacity that was previously provided by the Four Stars is actually what they have connected."
"What? What do they mean?"
Isn’t this your flagship phone? What does Laomai 801 mean? This is our previous generation chip. Isn’t this too tricky?
Now let us use the new production capacity to produce additional chips of the previous generation?
Although they themselves know that there are some issues with heat dissipation and power consumption of the 810, it is the first 64-bit quad-core model after all, and it still uses a 20nm process. Heat dissipation is a problem that mobile phone manufacturers need to solve, so what do they care about us?
“We don’t have much 801 inventory left, and many other mid-range mobile phone manufacturers have ordered a lot.”
"Then tell them that the 801 is gone. Do you want the 810? It's hard for Four Star to free up the production capacity. It must be to build the 810. If they are not satisfied, they can take it back and design and build it themselves. Haha~, Four Star's production can give them face. , but it also has to make money, and it can’t stay empty forever.”
“Besides us, let’s see where else they can buy it!”
Qualcomm indeed has this kind of dominance in the field of mobile phones.
Even they themselves have not yet come up with a 64-bit architecture, and they still use the public version of ARM. Now there are only a few companies in the world that can complete chip design!
Do you want love?
And Umbrella also received this kind of feedback.
We can even hear rumors from Qualcomm in the industry that the supply of 801 is tight. If you keep staring at 801, you will definitely have to wait for a long time and may have difficulty in giving birth...
……
Wang Yi, who was rafting with Qian Yayan and Liu Xiaoke, was speechless when he heard the feedback from Lin Shiqin.
"Didn't you help them coordinate part of Four Star's production capacity? Four Star has given up its burden?"
This is Wang Yi's guess. After all, Umbrella's mobile phone has entered a field that has a great impact on Four Star.
"No, Four Star relies on us a lot. They are arrogant when they should be arrogant, and they are quite honest when they should be honest. It was Qualcomm who adjusted that part to 810."
Hearing Lin Shiqin's words, Wang Yi was also speechless.
To be honest, Umbrella is eye-catching enough now, and he is not ready to directly enter the chip field so soon.
Fortunately, the outbreak of infection in Seoul some time ago made Umbrella still have the power to say "I really have it", so it's not impossible to get some first.
He was forced out, there was nothing he could do.
It's a pity that the 'I really have it' thing is the last trump card. Obviously, it is impossible to show up frequently. It will cause people to be wary. Talking too much will also reduce the deterrence, and you can't just do it to them casually. Otherwise, it would be equivalent to breaking up with the whole world.
Some regular trump cards need to be strengthened quickly, but the order has already been placed. For a ship of such a tonnage, even if you pay extra to jump in line, it will probably take at least a year.
Especially for the three million-ton platforms, each of the three parties of the Iron Triangle built one. If they could be completed within a year, it would be a matter of overtime work.
Originally, he said that after getting two new immunoglobulins for Umbrella, he would go out on the entire yacht to catch whales.
Now it seems that the chip problem must be rectified first.
"Is there no problem with the design on your side?"
"No problem, the ARM public version is 64-bit, but the ARM company authorization does not allow core modifications. If you want to modify it, you have to pay a lot of money. If you get the modification authorization, you can improve it a bit."
"No need, just design the public version of the architecture. How high can the craftsmanship be now?"
Four Star has brought back some obsolete equipment from the wafer factory, coupled with some domestic support and the DUV lithography machine that has been released, and after a little integration, the 20nm level process can be quickly achieved, and it will be launched simultaneously next year. 14nm is not a big problem.
However, the equipment shipped back from Four Star still needs debugging time, and there is no way to produce it immediately. We can only use the free production capacity of Four Star to quickly build some.
UMC's process breakthrough has encountered bottlenecks, but the current process is sufficient for manufacturing. Just when the rice is ready, we can also send some to OEM.
Chip design capabilities, that’s normal, right?
Originally, if it was a normal chip, it would take at least three to six months of "trial production" stage. This stage can also be called tape-out. The purpose is to first produce a small amount of dozens of pieces in a streamlined manner for testing. See Whether the requirements are met.
If the test passes, mass production can begin.
If there are problems, some modifications will be needed.
The structure of the chip itself is too complex and dense, so problems are quite normal.
However, this chip was designed by Lin Shiqin. It can be said that as long as the four-star technology is passable, there will be no problem of failure after passing Lin Shiqin's simulation.
This can greatly reduce the process and time directly to mass production!
Chip name, White Queen V1.0!
There is no doubt that the performance of the 'White Queen' chip has been improved after the replacement, so just define this batch as the plus version, and the price will be the same as that of the fruit.
You can't keep the price the same as the performance improves. This would be unfair to customers who bought in advance.
Well, maybe the output of the plus version will be higher than the regular version in the future!
……
"Self-developed chip? Let me go. Umbrella is really awesome. He throws out big moves without saying a word."
"It's amazing. Even this is just an official announcement about plus without saying anything in particular. This is the confidence."
"What are you doing plus! Please let me buy the regular version first. My friends have all started using Red Queen to play "Starry Sky World"."
“Shouldn’t this be considered a plug-in?”
"Does it count? Just fail physics and click on the wizard. Who told you not to have it?"
"It's painful, I have no choice but to exchange for fruit."
"It seems that other companies have also updated the Red Queen's connection one after another. Although it is not comparable in other aspects, at least it will be usable when the new version comes out."
"Umbrella is so stupid, cultivating competitors like this."
"Haha, Umbrella only charges 5% tax on ordinary smartphones and 10% on high-end smartphones. Why do you have to work hard when you can make money just lying around?"
"And the screen and camera are also theirs, don't forget the battery too! If their chip function is really as described, then the chip can also tear a hole."
"Does that mean other mobile phones are sold with just one brand?"
"Really just lying down and making money?"
"Good guy, I'm convinced."
"However, Umbrella's related research and development capabilities are really strong. The performance of the currently produced 'White Queen' even exceeds that of the same model in terms of parameters alone."
"Otherwise, why do you think it's called 'Umbrella'?"
"Damn it, you guys go to the external network and check it out. It's a bunker, it's from the Red Queen's mobile phone!"
"What happened again?"
But now that we have simultaneous translation, understanding has become quite simple. When I went out and took a look, the most popular thing at this time was a guy on TT talking excitedly about his experience in the hospital bed.
"Brothers, my life was saved by the 'Red Queen'!"
As he finished speaking, he took out his mobile phone, and saw that the Red Queen's mobile phone, which was not even broken at first, was now full of cracks and even deformed.
But looking at the cracks and deformation, no one thought that the quality of the Red Queen phone was poor!
Because there is a warhead embedded in the mobile phone, a warhead stained with blood!
The warhead was firmly stuck in the phone.
The penetrated battery did not explode at this time.
Then, the young man on the hospital bed said to the screen
"Brothers, the sad news is that I broke two ribs, so I need to be hospitalized now, but luckily, I survived!"
"Thank you Umbrella, thank you Red Queen, thank you for my mobile phone!"
"I will treasure it forever and pass it on because it saved my life!"
————Second update~
(End of chapter)