Posted 11/04/09 at 08:38:08 AM by Paul Lilly

Graphics chip maker Nvidia appears to be interested in talent from Transmeta, and that could mean only one thing: they're moving into the x86 market, says AmTech analyst Doug Freedman.

Freedman's theory is at least plausible. During a Q&A session at the Morgan Stanley Technology Conference in San Francisco earlier this year, Nvidia acknowledged it would eventually try its hand at the x86 business, saying it was a matter of "when," not "if."

If Nvidia's looking for the right time, now might be it. The chip maker continues to be at odds with Intel over continued licensing disputes, the latest of which has bumped Nvidia out of contention with Nehalem. And because AMD owns ATI, the chip maker finds itself between rock and a hard place.

That's not good, considering over 30 percent of Nvidia's revenue comes from chipsets. Backing out, even if temporary, puts a lot of pressure on the company's graphics business to hold the fort while licensing disputes are worked out.

It's worth noting that Nvidia probably wouldn't go after the high performance sector, where Intel's Core i7 pretty much stands alone. But the market is wide open in the low performance segment. An Atom alternative combined with the chip maker's Ion platform could conceivably shake things up and give Intel's Atom platform some serious competition.

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Posted 08/08/08 at 10:10:47 AM by Pulkit Chandna

Nvidia has licensed Transmeta’s power conserving technology for a sum of $25 million. The technologies that Transmeta has leased out to Nvidia include its flagship power management technologies, Longrun and Longrun 2. Transmeta has quickly mastered its current business model of licensing IP to bigger companies and its coffers are loaded with cash.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Nvidia has licensed Transmeta’s power management technology as most chip manufacturers are concentrating on increasing power efficiency.

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Posted 06/30/08 at 02:10:48 PM by Tom Halfhill

Will they never learn? Another start-up hoping to compete with mighty Intel has crashed, sending some 200 engineers to the unemployment line and squandering about $74 million from disgruntled investors. Montalvo Systems, originally named MemoryLogix, is now just another smoking crater in Silicon Valley.

Hit the jump for the full scoop on another chip maker who coulda been a contendah.

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Posted 01/30/08 at 03:18:04 PM by Tom Halfhill

A new lease on life working with its former competitors.

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