According to Pulsenews, Samsung Electronics is preparing to develop its own CPU cores for smartphones and PCs in order to reduce its reliance on British chip designer ARM and improve the optimization of its devices, industry sources have revealed.
Samsung Electronics recently formed an internal team dedicated to CPU core development, led by a veteran developer who was previously in charge of CPU development at AMD, several industry sources said Sunday.
The CPU is a key component for performing data operations and is an important part of the application processor (AP), which represents the “brain” of the smartphone. Samsung Electronics has previously relied on CPU cores from ARM to build its own AP chip, Exynos, and its rival Qualcomm also builds AP chips based on ARM designs. If it succeeds in developing its own CPU cores, it will help Samsung significantly improve the optimization of its smartphones.
Samsung Electronics is also accelerating the development process of next-generation AP chips, such as those designed specifically for its flagship Galaxy series, the report said. Its Systems LSI business unit set up an AP solutions development team late last year to work with its Mobile Experience (MX) business unit to advance next-generation advanced research and AP optimization efforts.
According to industry sources, the first chip from the team is called the Galaxy Chip and could be available in 2025. However, this chip is likely to use ARM technology-based CPU cores, as Samsung Electronics has just launched its own CPU core development project.
If Samsung Electronics succeeds in developing its own CPU core, it will help improve the competitiveness of its Galaxy Chip,” said an industry source who asked not to be named. If development proceeds as planned, Samsung could achieve its own CPU cores by 2027.”
This is not Samsung Electronics’ first attempt to develop its own CPU core, as the company invested in technology development back in the early 2010s, forming a team to acquire its own design capabilities. However, Samsung Electronics later ended the program, arguing that its mobile CPU cores were not as efficient as others such as Qualcomm in terms of multi-core and power efficiency. In 2019, Samsung Electronics laid off about 300 developers at its research center in Austin, Texas, USA.
Currently, the high-end mobile AP market is dominated by Qualcomm, while the low-end market is occupied by MediaTek.
Samsung has not yet officially responded to this.
