SAN JOSE -- Google isexpected to boost its support in Android for cores from MIPS Technologies,giving the company a badly needed boost in the hot smartphone and tabletsector.
The Android native developers' kit is expected to startbundling a GNU compiler for MIPS within weeks. Google is expected to bundlefull support for the MIPS application binary interface in all Android code andlibraries, starting with a future Android release in the next several months.
"Google has started to take notice of the volume shipmentsof MIPS-based Android tablets," said Amit Rohatgi, principal mobile architectat MIPS, speaking at the Linley Tech Mobile Conference here.
About 1.8 million MIPS-based Android tablets have shipped todate, Rohatgi said. They are mainly low cost systems from China OEMs powered bySoCs from MIPS licensees such as Ingenic Semiconductor.
Philips recently became the first global brand company toship an Android tablet using the Ingenic SoC. Like many of the China brandedsystems, it sports a seven-inch screen.
The news comes as reports say MIPS may be preparing for asale due to declining financial results. The architecture has a solid base innetworking and set-top boxes, but has yet to gain a broad foothold in mobilewhere ARM holds sway.
In terms of software support, as much as 85% of Android appsrun on the OS's Dalvik virtual machine interpreter. But as many as 80,000 ofthe half a billion apps in the Android online store run natively, targeting theARM architecture.
Code for running Android apps on MIPS already exists.Getting Google to bundle it all as part its standard releases is expected toease the sometimes tedious job of integrating all the software needed tosupport the architecture.
"My number one headache and job is to make sure all the toolchains are complete for Android on MIPs," said Rohatgi. "We absolutely must getofficial support for the MIPS ABI in Android, and that's coming," he added.
Separately, Rohatgi works with leading apps developers toget them to support MIPS in their code. A MIPS emulator called MagiCode isalready available as a download so users can run ARM-based Android apps on aMIPS system.
The good news for China mobile chip designers is licensesfor the MIPS cores cost "a fraction" of the reported $5 million it costs tolicense an ARM Cortex A9.
The Ingenic SoC is a 1.2 GHz device that competes favorablywith the Cortex A8. A version with two MIPS CPU cores will sample later thisyear, targeting the A9, but consuming slightly more power than the ARM chip.
A 64-bit Ingenic chip aimed at the A15 is in an early designphase, targeting use in late 2013 products, Rohatgi said.
For its part, Intel has also forged closer links with Googleso its x86 also will get as much support under Android as ARM. Andy Rubin, whoheads Android work at Google, appeared at the Intel Developer Conference lastfall as part of an announcement of closer collaboration between the twocompanies.
This story was originally posted by EETimes.
