competitively to whom?
can Intel sell chips cheaper to Samsung than the margins they currently have by vertically integrating?
No, but Samsung lead is not set in stone either.
Can Intel sell chips cheaper to Apple than the margins they currently have by designing their own chips? That is excluding the massive headache of losing legacy software and losing flexibility in favour of Intel roadmaps
I would be more opened on Apple, they are loosing market share it seems, if Intel provide them with a significant competitive advantage, they could make the jump. At this point unlikely but you never know.
Can Intel sell chips cheaper than the chinese vendors?
No and I don't think that any bog company is interesting in doing so, I would think margins are way too low.
That leaves Qualcomm. And their advantage in mobile has never been about the performance of their chips but their time to market and basebands.
Intel is catching up, and it is not only about baseband, their overall offering is competitive /among the best.
Outside of the techworld, nobody cares if their phone has Intel chip or Tegra chip. Or if its 64% faster or slower. As long as its fast enough it will be fine. So why would an OEM buy Intel when their customers do not care?
That is pushing, all of sudden because Intel is to take the lead performance are all of the sudden irrelevant? They are not most people do not read detailed review but they hear (word to mouth) about which phone is 'best', etc. Related to silicon performance is battery life and that is something people cares about.
Pretty much it is the job of the phone manufacturers, /their marketing team, to present their phone as the best without hammering your average user with technical data he does not get.
And while Android can run X86, all the software is optimized for ARM, some native apps still have trouble with X86 processors. Its a massive uphill battle they are facing and their problems is not about their competitors having better performance. Unless Microsoft makes some kind of amazing X86 Windows Phone 9, i dont see anything changing in smartphones.
Well you made your point clearer, actually I agree with quite some things you stated, I don't expect Intel to have an easy ride (I think I posted something going in hat direction in the other Silvermont thread), technical merit goes only that far, Intel needs great partnership with company that can compete with the best I'm not sure that at this point companies like HTC or Nokia can even with what could be "the best phone" compete with the brand strength of Sansumg.
Though it is not like INtel needs to have X86 in every smartphone or tablets, they just need to capture a decent share of the market too keep its fab busy neither they need the first devices powered by their new chip to become instantly king of the hill. Though people will have interest in the product powered by the tech if it indeed the best, most powerful available solution, then it is herding behavior.
Intel has to build its brand name in that realm, it is not impossible, uphill batlle? Yes but after years of X86 sucks, etc they seems to have chip nobody should be able to match till better process are available (and at which time Intel should jump to a new process too). It is not about killing ARM anyway, INtel just need the extra volume (and nice margins if they offer the "best money can buy) to maintain its volume and process advantage.
In the geek world they are a lot of people that have for years de facto against Intel, their POV is irrelevant once products hit the streets along with reviews I would be surprised if those that set trends don't jump on the most powerful phone there is, especially if the competition has nothing coming that can compete. Intel needs to spend Dollars in marketing and help if needed the partners that chose their chip.