Samsung devices could soon be powered by custom Samsung CPUs
Samsung Electronics is reportedly working on developing custom CPUs for smartphones and computers. The report comes from BusinessKorea, a Korean website that publishes news in English.
Samsung uses ARM technology currently for CPU cores in its custom-made Exynos application processors (APs). Qualcomm, one of Samsung’s rivals, is also using APs based on ARM designs.
Samsung plans to reduce its dependence on other companies, specifically ARM. Apple has started to use its own chips in some of its products recently, and Samsung wants to achieve the same for its products.
If Samsung manages to control the entire process, design, develop and manufacturer, it could help the company optimize its processors for its devices, improve its bottom line and increase its competitiveness in the sector.
BusinessKorea notes that Samsung hired former AMD senior developer Rahul Tuli to lead an internal team at the company that is tasked with developing CPUs for Samsung. Samsung hopes that it can integrate its own CPUs into its electronic products by 2027.
Samsung announced the new Exynos 2200 mobile processor in January 2023. The “game changing” processor has a “AMD RDNA 2 architecture based Samsung Xclipse graphics processing unit”, the “most cutting-edge Arm-based CPU cores available in the market today”, and “an upgraded neural processing unit”.
The chip uses the “the most advanced 4-nanometer” and combines this with “cutting-edge mobile, GPU, and NPU technology”. The processor is the first to support hardware-accelerate ray tracing on mobile according to Samsung.
Another Samsung Electronics division is also working on next-generation application processors. Samsung’s System LSI division has a new AP Solution Development Team and Mobile Experience Division, which are tasked with optimizing APs.
BusinessKorea reports that the joint team is researching next-generation chips using the codename Galaxy Chip. The main plan is to develop chips that are better optmized than existing chips. The first chips could become available in 2025, but will be based on ARM design and not on upcoming Samsung CPUs, as these are not expected to become available before 2027.
The project is not Samsung’s first attempt at developing its own chips. Back in the early 2010s, Samsung started to work on developing and manufacturing its own CPUs. Comparison with Qualcomm chips at the time were unfavorable, however, and Samsung made the decision to halt the project. The company laid off more than 300 developers at the Samsung Austin Research Center in 2019 as a consequence.
To compete with Qualcomm and Apple, Samsung needs to even the playing field, and that involves developing its own CPUs. If Samsung fails to succeed this time, it still has the ARM fallback, but this would put Samsung at a disadvantage against Apple.
Samsung showcased its latest products recently at the MWC in Barcelona, Spain.
2023/02/samsung
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