ARM acquires Falanx

[arjan de lumens]

http://www.arm.com/news/13706.html

(not sure whether here or the 3d graphics industry forum is more appropriate, but whatever; given that both ARM and Falanx so far have their main focus on handhelds, I would presume that this is relevant for this forum anyway.)

 

[Zaphod]

I wonder why they mentioned 'net assets of NOK 2 million'. That’s virtually nothing, and probably just includes cash minus debt and computers, licensed software, office furniture, coffee makers, and other physical objects that are still new enough to have a taxable value.

How much they paid for IP and personnel would be much more interesting to know.

 

[dharold]

And in related news:

http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?ID=633

 

[Lazy8s]

ARM works with just about every chip maker in the portable and embedded sectors (rival core SuperH is receiving less emphasis even from its owner, Renesas, recently), so this deal will bring maximum exposure to the Mali IP and instantly make it a major competitive option.

Mali's tile-based immediate mode rendering hybrid architecture promises some unique advantages, so this deal also results in bringing some much needed diversification to the graphics market.

This arrangement will fill the role for ARM's second generation graphics solution that PowerVR MBX's IP had for its first generation cores. The first generation solution will continue to use MBX, but Mali's OpenGL ES 2-level technology will make up the new offering.

In addition to the positive effect of promoting Falanx's technology, PowerVR doesn't seem to suffer much. The vast majority of Imgtec's customers were already licensing PowerVR directly from them as opposed to signing through the ARM partnership (and one which had previously gone through ARM recently switched to direct licensing from Imgtec) a partnership which split the revenue when it was used.

This must be one of the two acquisitions of portable GPU design companies that Jon Peddie mentioned were still in negotiation after the Bitboys deal. That leaves another...

 

[dharold]

"The first generation solution will continue to use MBX"

Well not quite. As we said today: "Imagination Technologies and ARM will carry on working together in supporting the current PowerVR MBX customers and will co-operate to ensure that their relevant complementary technologies continue to operate well together and support ongoing market requirements."

So customers who've already licensed PowerVR MBX via ARM will continue to be supported together but further license deals for MBX will all come via Imagination.

It's really been very amicable. We've been in discussions for months before reaching this decision and will no doubt continue to have customers in common in the future. We have a good relationship with ARM, but now on a clearly differrent footing. SGX and MBX will continue to support ARM processors, but they're now only licensable from us.

As pointed out above the direction of customer engament was moving that way anyhow with companies chosing to license directly.

 

[Rolf N]

And in related news:

http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?ID=633

That's very interesting. Especially the part about Intel still having some SoCs in the pipeline (third paragraph).
Some people have said Intel would get rid of the XScale business, and some other people (such as me) feared that this would be the end of Intel products that include PowerVR graphics.

Care to comment?

 

[arjan de lumens]

How much they paid for IP and personnel would be much more interesting to know.

http://www.digi.no/php/art.php?id=308807 (in Norwegian; you can find an online Norwegian-to-English translator here ) - according to Falanx CEO Borgar Ljosland, the sum is "less than $30 million", although he doesn't reveal how much less.

 

[nobond]

Mali .vs. PowerVR

"Mali's tile-based immediate mode rendering hybrid architecture promises some unique advantages, so this deal also results in bringing some much needed diversification to the graphics market."

I think Mali is the tile-based immediate mode and PowerVR is the tile-based defrred mode.
Is there a technical analysis on these two's difference ?

 

[Lazy8s]

From Falanx's perspective:

http://www.us.design-reuse.com/articles/article9591.html

 

[Xmas]

That article really is very one-sided (viewed from the other side ). Interestingly enough, their numbers on MBX are wrong (referring to this PDF?). And MBX is not a "traditional tile-based renderer" according to this article.

 

[arjan de lumens]

That article really is very one-sided (viewed from the other side ). Interestingly enough, their numbers on MBX are wrong (referring to this PDF?). And MBX is not a "traditional tile-based renderer" according to this article.

Care to elucidate on the differences between MBX and our idea of the "traditional tile-based renderer"?

 

[nobond]

immediate and deferred

I do not have a lot of depth knowledge on graphics.
Generally thinking, if the tiled based and the immediate mode is combined together.
It looks to me the game developer should think drawing in tiles otherwise it is not an efficient approach. The deferred mode may hide some tile based details from the programmer since the driver/compile may tackle this ?

 

[Simon F]

I do not have a lot of depth knowledge on graphics.

Luckily, I do have a little ;-)

Generally thinking, if the tiled based and the immediate mode is combined together.
It looks to me the game developer should think drawing in tiles otherwise it is not an efficient approach.

I can't speak for Falanx's approach but, with PowerVR, the developer does not have to think about drawing in tiles at all. It's all transparent.

 

[mboeller]

strange!

Originally designed in 1998 to meet the OpenGL®2.0 standard, the Mali architecture has been streamlined for OpenGL®ES 1.1.

Is Mali really 8 years old?

 

[nobond]

Yup. That is what I want to say.

PowerVR claims to be a deferred mode
Mali claims to be an immediate mode.

So powervr can fight

Luckily, I do have a little ;-)

I can't speak for Falanx's approach but, with PowerVR, the developer does not have to think about drawing in tiles at all. It's all transparent.

 

[Nappe1]

strange!




Is Mali really 8 years old?

basically that would indicate that they did build Mali on top, or at the basis, that were laid on during desktop chip development during years 1997 - 1998.

In this light their approarch is complete different that BB had, because BB basically dropped pretty much all things that were going to be at Axe or Hammer and developed pretty much everything again for Mobile / Hand Held.

There's whole bunch of quite fun "rumours" about the days when BB changed the direction, but this is wrong thread, place and time to talk about those...

Arjan: Congratulations. I think this shows, as did show the buyout of BB, that FalanX really knows their stuff and ends quite few talks about "Nordic Bullshitting Companies."

 

[Zaphod]

basically that would indicate that they did build Mali on top, or at the basis, that were laid on during desktop chip development during years 1997 - 1998.

I don’t believe Falanx really had that phase. Apparently it started with discussions about a final project/thesis for the research and development phase (the final two years) of their engineering studies (five years total). Then they got some start-up funding from the government in 2000 to develop a business plan (placing second in a ‘venture cup’), incorporated in 2001 when they graduated (with the plan to pursue the mobile market) using money from a 'promising technical entrepreneur' government stipend. Then they found venture capital in 2003/2004.

Typical for tech companies sprung from a university environment, they’ve also been active recruiting from their old ranks since then, offering internships, research projects, and so on (both building local competence as well as getting work done ‘for free’).

 

[dharold]

That's very interesting. Especially the part about Intel still having some SoCs in the pipeline (third paragraph).
Some people have said Intel would get rid of the XScale business, and some other people (such as me) feared that this would be the end of Intel products that include PowerVR graphics.

Care to comment?

Not too much.... I expect the situation will be more clearly communicated at a later date, but for now I can say that we do not expect that our relationship with Intel will be affected in any significant way by recent developments.

 

[Loewe]

Not too much.... I expect the situation will be more clearly communicated at a later date, but for now I can say that we do not expect that our relationship with Intel will be affected in any significant way by recent developments.

Many thanks David!

I never expect a answer regarding zeckensack's post or more a answer like "We can't comment ... ", you know what I mean.

This is the better one!