Arm stopped selling licenses to Chinese companies for advanced processor architectures

Chinese processor developers are making serious bets on Arm and RISC architectures, since access to them has so far not been restricted by political opponents.
But now Arm has refused to export Neoverse V architecture licenses to China and this could become a nasty precedent, limiting the pace of development of China's national semiconductor industry.Image source: AlibabaBritish Arm holding, as the Financial Times reports, has determined that Chinese customers cannot buy licenses to use Neoverse V processor architectures because they allow processors to be built at performance levels that exceed the values allowed by US export rules.
The Neoverse V architecture includes elements developed in the United States, so British Arm has to negotiate the nuances of exporting the relevant technology with overseas officials.
As expected, the Chinese giant Alibaba as a result of such restrictions may face the inability to use the Neoverse V1 or V2 architecture in its processors.
In this case, the Chinese partners of Arm will be available architecture series Neoverse N2, which has a lower speed.This situation resonates with the restrictions, which have already faced NVIDIA, which lost the right to supply after the fall of next year, gas pedals generation calculations Ampere and Hopper with a certain level of performance.
The supplier was quick to react and started offering Chinese customers special A800 gas pedals, whose performance avoided the sanctions restrictions by a margin.
Arm's Chinese customers found themselves in a similar situation.
The same company, Alibaba, expected to buy a license from Arm to use the Neoverse V1 architecture to develop processors used in cloud systems.
Competitor Amazon Web Services in the U.S.
already uses the architecture of this series to create specialized processors used in its own infrastructure.
Alibaba representatives, on condition of anonymity, expressed dissatisfaction with Arm's behavior, stating its reluctance to sell technology to China even if such deals are adequately funded.

Arm's IPO is postponed - it will take place later in 2023

NVIDIA's deal to buy UK processor architecture developer Arm, which fell apart this spring due to opposition from regulators and activists, prompted Japan's SoftBank Corporation, the current asset owner, to bring Arm shares to the stock market, but it expected to do so by March 31, 2023.
Now there is information that the IPO could take place later next year.Image source: Getty ImagesThe fact is that in the calendar of Japanese SoftBank in March next year ends another fiscal period, and this milestone was originally seen as a benchmark for the return of Arm shares to the stock exchange.
SoftBank's priority remained the idea of placing Arm shares on the U.S.
stock exchange, as this would have raised more funds, but British authorities insisted on a dual offering that would have brought Arm shares back to the London Stock Exchange as well.
Before SoftBank bought Arm for $32 billion in 2016, the last of the companies remained public.The Register reports, citing its own sources, that Arm shareholders these days began receiving notices that a public offering would take place later in 2023.
Arm officials have confirmed that such discussions are underway, but no final decision has yet been made.
The current macroeconomic situation prevents the placement of shares at the stock market in the first quarter.
Interestingly, Masayoshi Son, head of SoftBank's parent company, made a reference to his plans to develop Arm's business for several years ahead during his recent speech, but he did not mention anything about an IPO in his speech.
However, this can be explained by a change in the structure of Arm's upcoming offering.
If SoftBank retains a large block of shares, it will still be able to significantly influence the business of the British company.

Arm responded to Qualcomm's counterclaim: licensing scheme will not change

British processor developer Arm, owned by Japanese conglomerate Softbank, filed a response to Qualcomm's counterclaim, rejecting all statements and accusations by the American company.
The company has no plans to change its licensing scheme.Image source: community.arm.comIn August Arm sued Qualcomm, which was the result of a dispute over the licensing of processor architecture.
Qualcomm responded with unexpected accusations against the British partner: according to the defendant, Arm in this way is revenge for its position against the failed merger with NVIDIA, and to consolidate its position the company allegedly decided to change the processor licensing scheme to the detriment of all chip makers - payments will be charged from manufacturers of end devices.Arm denied all these allegations and in its response to the counterclaim stressed that the essence of its claims is simple: when Qualcomm bought startup Nuvia, which was a licensee of Arm, the buyer Qualcomm assures that Arm decided to take advantage of the situation and get additional royalties, and the license terms were not intended to obtain such permission.
Finally, Arm categorically rejected Qualcomm's assertion that it plans to change its licensing model - the British company said that this information is misinformation and misleading, according to The Register.
In reality, the company is not going to limit partners' access to its technology and will continue to cooperate both with processor manufacturers and OEMs.

The share of laptops on Arm-processors will grow in the market by 10 times from 2020 to 2023 - Intel loses positions

Processors on Arm architecture are trying more and more actively to advance in the market of laptops.
According to experts at DigiTimes, by 2023 their share will be 13.9%.
Although at first glance it seems not very much in relation to the total mass, compared to 2020, the share will increase by 10 times - in that year such models on the market was only 1.4%.
In this case, Intel is actively losing ground in the mobile PC market.Image source: AppleAccording to Tom's Hardware, the DigiTimes report also reflects another trend - it seems that the dominance of Intel solutions in the notebook market is gradually coming to an end.
At the same time the whole segment is suffering from the current difficult macroeconomic situation and the decline in sales after the pandemic weakened.DigiTimes notes that the notebook market as a whole in 2022, there is a decline of 22.8 percent year-on-year - a total of about 190 million devices will be delivered.
However, experts predict a relative stabilization of demand in 2023 - sales should be about 200 million laptops.
Changes in sales will presumably fluctuate by up to 10%.An important role in the promotion of Arm-architecture in the market of laptops was played by Apple, which began in 2020 to promote MacBook on its own Arm-chipset.
For its part, Qualcomm is improving its solutions for Windows.
In addition, sales of Chromebooks on Arm have also recently received a certain impetus, but to a lesser extent than other platforms.Meanwhile, Intel is losing its leadership in the laptop segment due to a number of problems.
In addition to Arm processors that have challenged the hegemony of the x86 architecture, AMD is gaining ground.
Ryzen models have proven to be competitive in the notebook market, so they are increasingly trusted by manufacturers and customers.
According to DigiTimes, while Intel's share of the notebook market in 2016 was 82.2% (AMD accounted for 17.8% in the same year), in Q2 2022 Intel had only 63.5% of the market, while AMD strengthened its position to 36.4%.It is assumed that from 2024 will come other important changes - Qualcomm intends to introduce computer chipsets based on Nuvia developments, which will give new impetus to the Arm-architecture promotion.

Qualcomm again promised to turn the Windows PC market in two years - with Snapdragon based on Nuvia developments

Qualcomm has been optimistic about Windows PCs on Arm processors of the Snapdragon family for years.
However, with the developments of the startup Nuvia, acquired in 2021, the optimism turns into confidence - the company claims that in two years the disposition in the PC market will change.Image source: qualcomm.
comTalking to investors and analysts after announcing quarterly financial results, the company's CEO, Cristiano Amon, noted that OEMs have already expressed a desire to work with the company to release Windows PCs powered by Snapdragon processors, which will only hit the market in two years, Tom's Harware reports.
These processors use solutions from Nuvia, which specialized in server Arm processors.The release of next-generation PC chips is not easy for Qualcomm: it originally planned to start sending samples as early as August 2022 to start production and sales in 2023.
However, it was later decided to start shipping samples only in 2023, and Windows-based Snapdragon computers will begin a massive market conquest only in 2024.Mr.
Amon did not specify the number of projects in which Qualcomm chips have won competitive victories, and did not say when exactly in 2024 we should expect the next generation products, but the growing number of such projects indicates that OEMs are quite willing to start shipping Windows-based Arm-computers in two years.
And that's a good sign not only for Qualcomm, but also for other Arm chipmakers.A significant obstacle to achieving the goal could be a legal dispute between Qualcomm and Arm.
According to the British company, after the takeover, Qualcomm had to stop projects Nuvia, because under the new owner the license for Arm-architecture is no longer valid.
In addition, Arm is likely to change the licensing mechanisms of its products.

Former head of iPhone development joins Arm's board of directors

Tony Fadell, formerly head of iPhone development, has joined Arm's board of directors.
His goal in his new position is to help the developer of processor architectures reach beyond the mobile device market to a broader segment of the digital world.Image source: build-collective.comFadell's choice of Arm processors as the foundation for the iPod and iPhone solidified the company's position early in the smartphone era.
Today this architecture is successfully conquering both the segment of personal computers with Apple M1 and M2 chips, and the server direction with processors like Amazon Graviton.
In an exclusive interview with CNET, the expert said Arm would greatly benefit from his experience in end-product development: \"I can bring a more system-level vision.
\u003C...> I think about the end consumer.\" Nowadays Tony Fadell is the head of Build Collective, an investment and consulting company.
Arm is at a critical point in its history as the company is sure that the processor architecture it creates will lead to a dramatic increase in digital devices and their importance in the life of modern man.
We are talking about vehicles with autopilot, smart watches, security cameras, and voice assistants built into smart speakers.Fadell also noted that if to Arm-processors in the iPod players in Apple no questions, in the case of the iPhone, he had to defend his position, because the former head of the company Steve Jobs was inclined in favor of Intel chips.
After leaving Apple, Fadell founded Nest, a company specializing in smart home technology, later taken over by Google, and again designed equipment based on Arm-chips.

Arm will prohibit the proximity of its CPU and third-party modules in one chip, as well as impose royalties on manufacturers of end devices

The lawsuit between Arm and Qualcomm turned unexpectedly.The British developer of processors decided to radically change its business model: first, license fees will have to be paid by manufacturers of end devices, including smartphones and tablets; second, third-party components, including GPUs, NPUs and ISPs, will be prohibited in chips with Arm processors.

In late August Arm filed a lawsuit against Qualcomm.Qualcomm absorbed server processor developer NUVIA and, according to Arm, had to update its license agreement because it deemed all previous agreements with the company invalid after it bought it.Qualcomm filed a countersuit against the British developer, and new documentation on the case contains crucial details.Qualcomm's updated lawsuit says that after 2024, Arm will stop licensing its processor architecture to semiconductor component manufacturers - payments will be charged to end-device manufacturers.

Arm, according to the U.S.company, has already told OEMs that soon the only way for them to get Arm-based chips will be through direct license fees, and they'll have to accept these rules of the game.But that's not all.The British company has also decided to tighten its policy with respect to chip developers like Qualcomm: they will not be able to use third-party components in single-chip platforms with Arm processors if Arm offers their analogs as a licensed product.

This will affect graphics and network processors, as well as image processors.In other words, Arm will prohibit the creation of duos like Samsung and AMD chips, as well as MediaTek and Imagination - both pairs of companies cooperate in the field of mobile graphics.And Qualcomm itself does not use GPUs from Arm, but its own.Such an initiative Arm shows signs of anti-competitive behavior and it is possible that these steps will accelerate the companies' efforts to develop chips based on open architecture RISC-V.However, some of the British company's partners may not be affected by the new rules.

For example, NVIDIA has a 20-year license for the development of components with Arm-architecture.Apple was at the origins of Arm, so it is unlikely that these two can be destroyed so easily.There is also a version that a mutually beneficial cooperation binds Arm with Broadcom.Thus, the dispute between Arm and Qualcomm in just over two years threatens to affect the interests of many smaller players.

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Arm has separated automotive chip development into a separate division

In late September, the British holding Arm appointed a new CFO and added two members to the board of directors, which can be taken as a sign of preparation for a public offering, but the changes did not stop there.
The division that developed solutions for the automotive industry has been separated, and there was rotation among the heads of all major divisions.Source image: Getty ImagesAbout this on the pages of the corporate blog said Arm CEO Rene Haas.
According to him, so far the solutions for the automotive industry and the Internet of Things have been developed by one unit, but progress in both areas pushes the company to separate them.
In total, Arm will now have four main areas of activity: automotive, customer (responsible for technology for the consumer market), infrastructure and the Internet of Things.From the previously unified division of automotive solutions and the Internet of Things is Dipti Vachani (Dipti Vachani), he will now oversee the automotive business Arm in the post of senior vice president.
Paul Williamson, who previously headed the customer division, will move to head the IoT business, also taking the position of senior vice president.
The client business will be led by Chris Bergey, who was previously in charge of Arm's infrastructure solutions.
Finally, Mohamed Awad, who held the top IoT position, will head the infrastructure business, also as senior vice president.
According to the CEO, \"the change is critical to our success,\" which is why management sees this shift as the key to Arm's success.