SAN JOSE -- Driven by the growth of mobile devices, merchantCPU cores shipped in more than 10 billion chips last year, up 25% over 2010,according to a new report. ARM Ltd commanded 78% of that market while Ceva andImagination Technologies took even larger chunks of the smaller markets for DSPand graphics cores, said the report from the Linley Group (Mountain View, Calif).
ARM's success casts a shadow on its archrival, MIPSTechnologies. MIPS recently said it may sell some of its patents, and isreportedly seeking an acquisition partner.
For its part, ARM collected royalties on 7.9 billion chipsin 2011 at an average rate of about 4.6 cents per chip, down from 4.8% in theprior year, said the report. ARM's royalties are up 19% on a compound basisfrom 2007-2011 while overall semiconductor industry revenues grew just 4% inthe same period.
By contrast, MIPS Technologies reported royalties on 656million chips in 2011 at a rate of about seven cents per chip. It took thirdplace in the market at 6% behind the ARC cores of Synopsys at 10%, the reportsaid.
"Despite a general industry need for a strong alternative toARM, MIPS is slowly sinking below the threshold of viability," the report said.
"Without new customers, MIPS cannot survive, but the merepossibility that the company could collapse or be sold to an unknown bidderwill make it difficult to sign new licensees," the report said. "We expectmajor changes to occur within the next year," it added.
ARM's dominance "has created an unbalanced market," thereport concluded. Indeed, at least one semiconductor executive said China'smobile chip designers want an alternative to what they see as ARM's highroyalty rates with some already turning to the Power architecture.
MIPS is suffering in part from a lack of R&D resources,said J Scott Gardner, a Linley Group senior analyst and co-author of thereport. "There was a window of opportunity for MIPS to be out with a 64-bitarchitecture before the ARM V8, but that window is closing," he said.
The report validated the group's predictions in 2008 thatthe market of 5.3 billion chips with merchant CPU cores would double by 2012.Last year's growth fell short of 2010, however, which saw a 30% increase over2009.
"We expect CPU IP to maintain a 10% compound annual growthrate through 2016 as the market matures and smartphone growth slows," thereport said.
Imagination, Cevaride highLike the CPU core market, the DSP and graphics core marketsare dominated by single vendors.
Imagination Technologies took 82% of the graphics coremarket and increased its royalty revenue by 69% in 2011. Ceva took 90% of theDSP core market and expanded its DSP royalties by 59%.
The report counted Tensilica and Synopsys' ARC cores as CPUblocks, although many are used as DSPs. However, even if both were counted asDSPs, Ceva would still dominate the sector, said Gardner. Ceva's closestcompetitor is the ZSP core from Verisilicon that took 9% of the market in 2011,according to the report.
Overall shipments of merchant DSP cores grew 44% in 2011 tosee use in 1.16 billion chips in 2011, thanks mainly to their adoption ascellular baseband processors. To fuel growth, Ceva must "extend their reach andthey are doing that with new products that address a broader range of markets --that's their challenge," said Gardner.
Graphics cores represent the smallest but fastest growing ofthe processor core markets. Shipments exceeded 300 million units in 2011, upfrom less than 90 million in 2008, the report said.
ARM took last place in this sector with a 4% share whileVivante was second and DMP third at 8% and 6%, respectively.
"I'm still bullish on ARM's Mali cores due to the company'sreach," said Gardner. "They should do well, and their Samsung win wasimportant," he added.
He predicted Imagination will continue to lead the sector,particularly if it retains its design wins with Apple. Long term, however, ARMcould exert a threat if it can derive advantages from SoCs that use both itsCPU and graphics cores, he added.
This story was originally posted by EETimes.
