Intel chips could have powered first iPhone, CEO Otellini says

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Comments

  • Reply 21 of 39
    tundraboytundraboy Posts: 1,884member
    A 'regrettable' decision by a 'regretful' ex-CEO. Unless abstract things like decisions and ideas now have feelings and sentiments.
  • Reply 22 of 39
    kdarlingkdarling Posts: 1,640member



    Quote:

    Originally Posted by drblank View Post


    They wanted to use ARM, it was just using Intel to mfg the chip for them.  There were lots of ARM designs floating around.   it didn't say that they wanted a specific INTEL chip, just a chip Apple was interested.  That's how I read it.



     


    Back then it would've been normal to pick a stock part (Apple wasn't designing ARM SoCs yet), and that's exactly what his comment said:


     


    "there was a chip that they were interested in, that they wanted to pay a certain price for "


     


    Knowing smartphone history (and having our memory jogged by dreyfus2), it seems totally clear that Apple wanted an Intel XScale CPU, which used the ARMv5 architecture.


     


    By 2005/2006, the XScale was the CPU in many of the better smartphones.  RIM, Dell, Palm, Motorola, custom devices... everyone used it...  customers wanted it.

  • Reply 23 of 39
    jbcarojbcaro Posts: 47member


    Wouldn't have looked very good with the giant "intel inside" sticker on the phone.

  • Reply 24 of 39
    mac95mac95 Posts: 26member
    from what I read a few times, it was about Atom chips.
  • Reply 25 of 39
    bdkennedy1bdkennedy1 Posts: 1,459member
    Yeah, if we wanted 1 day battery life.
  • Reply 26 of 39
    mac95mac95 Posts: 26member
    ... after having po'd Apple big time with 'Intel's Ultrabook initiative'...? :)
  • Reply 27 of 39
    spacepowerspacepower Posts: 208member
    The calendar 4Q2012 the entire PC market was estimated to be less than 90 million units, that includes Macs and PCs using AMD chips.

    The iOS device market including iPads, iPhones, iPod Touches , and AppleTVs sold around 80 million units.

    Lets assume for arguements sake that AMD chips were in 10 million of those 90 million PCs sold. So lets call call all Intel based PCs 80 million and all iOS units 80 million.

    Intel could have doubled the number of chips they sold, excluding non traditional PCs.

    Granted the prices and margins would be lower, but not to far from ATOM processor.

    Regardless, Intel left 80 million chips to be manufactured and sold by Samsung in just one quarter.

    If and when Apple moves away from Samsung, to another foundry, then Samsung has excess capacity to build ARM chips for other customers. Since the new customers won't be buying in the quanties that Apple demanded, Samsung can raise their prices. Think 6-10 companies splitting that 80 million chips that Apple once ordered. Samsung's new profits can be put back into r&d, and production efficiencies.

    If Windows RT ever matures and takes off on ARM, Samsung could catch up to Intel in the market.

    Samsung's support of Chromebooks is all about selling more Samsung ARM chips.

    Samsung's strategy in this is quite clever here, putting effort into the platforms that use more of their parts, Chromebooks and Windows RT, where they supply the RAM, NAND, and the most expensive part, the processor. Although on Windows RT, the OS may cost more than the processor. Hence, Samsung the biggest supporter of Chrombooks.

    Asus or Acer, or whichever derided Windows RT publicly is pissed that they have to compete with Samsung, an ARM chip producer, who also produces their own internal components.

    Anyway rant over
  • Reply 28 of 39
    bestkeptsecretbestkeptsecret Posts: 4,265member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by jbcaro View Post


    Wouldn't have looked very good with the giant "intel inside" sticker on the phone.



     


    I'm just curious - did Apple ever have 'Intel Inside' stickers on any of their Macs? I bought my iMac in 2009, but I have a Mini from 2006/2007. None of them have the sticker.

  • Reply 29 of 39
    MacProMacPro Posts: 19,718member
    Had Intel fabricated an ARM chip for Apple's iDevices I suspect another alternative universe may have come about. Instead of Samsung being where it is now Microsoft might well be riding high in the mobile arena. I have little doubt Intel would taken all they learned from Apple and would have colluded with their long time cohorts in Redmond and we'd have seen Wintel iDevice rip offs. As to what OS they'd have run, therein lies another interesting array of possible alternative universes.
  • Reply 30 of 39
    kdarlingkdarling Posts: 1,640member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by digitalclips View Post



    Had Intel fabricated an ARM chip for Apple's iDevices I suspect another alternative universe may have come about. Instead of Samsung being where it is now Microsoft might well be riding high in the mobile arena. I have little doubt Intel would taken all they learned from Apple and would have colluded with their long time cohorts in Redmond and we'd have seen Wintel iDevice rip offs. As to what OS they'd have run, therein lies another interesting array of possible alternative universes.


     


    Interesting thought, but I think its basis is flawed. 


     


    Selling chips to Apple didn't give insider info about the iPhone's shape, OS, etc.  At most, it might've foretold a few basic specs (display size, CPU speed).


     


    Everything else that's really important was available the moment the phone was shown off.   In other words, Intel and Microsoft (and Samsung and everyone else) had everything they needed to know about the iPhone in January 2007.

  • Reply 31 of 39
    auxioauxio Posts: 2,717member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by BestKeptSecret View Post


     


    I'm just curious - did Apple ever have 'Intel Inside' stickers on any of their Macs? I bought my iMac in 2009, but I have a Mini from 2006/2007. None of them have the sticker.



     


    Nope, never had it.  Apple's always avoided making internal hardware details front-and-center like that.  And the Mac clones were all made in the PowerPC era.

  • Reply 32 of 39
    MacProMacPro Posts: 19,718member
    kdarling wrote: »
    Interesting thought, but I think its basis is flawed. 

    <span style="line-height:1.231;">Selling chips to Apple didn't give insider info about the iPhone's shape, OS, etc.  At most, it might've foretold a few basic specs (display size, CPU speed).</span>


    Everything else that's really important was available the moment the phone was shown off.   In other words, Intel and Microsoft (and Samsung and everyone else) had everything they needed to know about the iPhone in January 2007.

    In one of those alternative time lines Sammy didn't get to make all this money and Microsoft got a leg up. I'm pretty sure just as Intel decided, even late in the day, copying the MacBook Air was a good idea, copying an iPhone and iPad with whatever OS MS managed to pull off (perhaps MS buying WebOS in this universe) was worth it too, even if a year or two behind. After all PC plus Windows followed well behind Mac. DTP was well into it's success story when Aldus ported PageMaker to the PC for example.

    It is a purely a scifi theory, I admit, and is as much guess work as your appraisal of the theory is. Hindsight is great but hard to do in the parallel universe. ;) Having, like you, been closely involved in this industry since the late 1970's I often play 'what if' in such a manner. It's fun to speculate.
  • Reply 33 of 39
    smileydudesmileydude Posts: 111member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by auxio View Post


     


    Nope, never had it.  Apple's always avoided making internal hardware details front-and-center like that.  And the Mac clones were all made in the PowerPC era.



     


    True, but for some odd reason they did have PowerPC logos on the cases of the early Power Macs.  That went away under Jobs with the introduction of the iMac and B&W G3.

  • Reply 34 of 39
    asciiascii Posts: 5,936member


    Shouldn't have bet against the Steve. Even Microsoft got it's start developing software for Apple computers.

  • Reply 35 of 39
    sockrolidsockrolid Posts: 2,789member


    Steve Jobs as Qui-Gon Jinn (making a subtle hand gesture): "You'll give us the unit price we want."


     


    Paul Otellini as Watto: "Mind tricks don't work on me.  Only money.  No money, no parts, no deal."

  • Reply 36 of 39
    suddenly newtonsuddenly newton Posts: 13,819member
    sockrolid wrote: »
    Steve Jobs as Qui-Gon Jinn (making a subtle hand gesture): "You'll give us the unit price we want."

    Paul Otellini as Watto: "Mind tricks don't work on me.  Only money.  No money, no parts, no deal."

    I deleted that movie from my personal holocron. To end the pain :)
  • Reply 37 of 39
    suddenly newtonsuddenly newton Posts: 13,819member
    kdarling wrote: »
    Everything else that's really important was available the moment the phone was shown off.   In other words, Intel and Microsoft (and Samsung and everyone else) had everything they needed to know about the iPhone in January 2007.

    "Ultraphone, inspired by intel."
  • Reply 38 of 39

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sflocal View Post



    "Could have... would have... should have"  "Hindsight always provides a view with 20/20 vision"



    "cry me a river"  "seeing the bigger picture"



    "under your watch"  "a post-PC world"


     


    Think you could work a few more cliches in there ...?

  • Reply 39 of 39
    jragostajragosta Posts: 10,473member
    "The thing you have to remember is that this was before the iPhone was introduced and no one knew what the iPhone would do," the Intel chief said. "At the end of the day, there was a chip that they were interested in that they wanted to pay a certain price for and not a nickel more and that price was below our forecasted cost. I couldn't see it. It wasn't one of these things you can make up on volume. And in hindsight, the forecasted cost was wrong and the volume was 100x what anyone thought.""

    Samsung seems to be making lots of money selling chips to Apple. So what's the lesson?

    1. Intel can't forecast worth a darn
    or
    2. Intel can't make chips as cheaply as Samsung can.

    Either way, Intel screwed up.
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