Apple loses second key chip engineer, this time to Microsoft

Posted:
in General Discussion edited January 2022
Microsoft has hired a key semiconductor designer away from Apple in an effort to expand its own efforts developing server chips, marking the second departure from Apple's chip team in recent weeks.

Microsoft sign
Microsoft sign


Mike Filippo, who joined Apple in 2019, will reportedly work on processors in Microsoft's Azure group, Bloomberg reported Wednesday.

The poaching hints that Microsoft could be accelerating efforts to build first-party server chips for its cloud computing services. The company's primary rivals, Amazon and Alphabet, are making similar moves.

Before joining Apple in 2019, Filippo served as a top chip architect at Arm for around 10 years. Prior to that, he worked at Intel. During his tenure at Arm, he was credited with advancing the architecture's underlying technologies for mobile and other platforms, Bloomberg points out.

As far as Apple is concerned, Filippo's departure marks the second high-profile chip engineer hired away by another company. Earlier in January, Intel poached lead Apple Silicon designer Jeff Wilcox.

A report from late December 2021 indicated that Apple was taking steps to prevent poaching, including offering top engineering talent stock bonuses worth up to $180,000.

Technology giants are increasingly looking to develop first-party chips as global supply constraints and semiconductor shortages loom overage the industry.

Apple is further along in its first-party chip strategy than other companies. Back in October, it announced the M1 Pro and M1 Max, two Apple Silicon chips that are still leading the pack as far as performance as power efficiency.

Read on AppleInsider
williamlondon
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 45
    Feel bad for Apple, so since now Apple is a lead in this market so when there’s two people left the company, will they take the technology from Apple with them to the new company so Innoway it’s like they’re stealing from the company to another?
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 2 of 45
    Well Apple is doomed for sure now.

    Fucked framing of the story, can you *try* and be more negative please, we haven't had enough trolls join in the past few days.
    jas99lkruppwatto_cobra
  • Reply 3 of 45
    DuhSesameDuhSesame Posts: 1,278member
    Well Apple is doomed for sure now.

    Fucked framing of the story, can you *try* and be more negative please, we haven't had enough trolls join in the past few days.
    Need me to at Avon b7?  I’m sure he’ll be more than glad to show us the WOW way.
    williamlondonlkruppwatto_cobra
  • Reply 4 of 45
    DuhSesameDuhSesame Posts: 1,278member
    Anyway, that’s silly.  These chip companies will no doubt have technical reserves up to two or three years.  It’s just a matter of hiring smart people.
    williamlondonwatto_cobra
  • Reply 5 of 45
    avon b7avon b7 Posts: 7,624member
    DuhSesame said:
    Well Apple is doomed for sure now.

    Fucked framing of the story, can you *try* and be more negative please, we haven't had enough trolls join in the past few days.
    Need me to at Avon b7?  I’m sure he’ll be more than glad to show us the WOW way.
    Ha! 

    I didn't read anything negative about this story. It's just another story. An info piece. Where's the problem?

    Engineers and scientists move around just like most employees do. Apple picks up talent from other companies just as other companies pick up talent from Apple. 

    Processor design though, definitely isn't a one man show (or two man! ) and new talent is rising all the time. 

    As for 'WOW', well there's plenty of that outside of Apple, too. 




    ctt_zhelijahgcat52viclauyycmuthuk_vanalingamapplguycrowleyGeorgeBMacbyronl
  • Reply 6 of 45
    DuhSesameDuhSesame Posts: 1,278member
    Well there he is.
    lkruppwatto_cobra
  • Reply 7 of 45
    DuhSesame said:
    Well there he is.
    Blocked the Android shill years ago.
    lkruppStrangeDayswatto_cobra
  • Reply 8 of 45
    Small bonus of money was reason as usually.. CEO can hv 100mil bonus for traveling and smiling and same time they pay so less the top brains!! 
    elijahg
  • Reply 9 of 45
    DuhSesameDuhSesame Posts: 1,278member
    DuhSesame said:
    Well there he is.
    Blocked the Android shill years ago.
    Well we missed out the wow factor.
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 10 of 45
    Kind of doubting that this persons “key”ness as it pertains to post M2 development. Supposedly the M2 is a marginal improvement over M1. Kinda doubt Apple ID super happy about that. 

    If you are great at what you do, then great. But if you don’t keep getting better, you get left behind. Not saying that’s what happened here, but there are so many angles to these things. 

    Apple has more than enough resources and cool factor to be more rewarding to these guys than Ms Or Intel. 

    If they leave, Apple isn’t losing sleep. 

    maximarawatto_cobra
  • Reply 11 of 45
    Microsoft may not be imitate Apple M! development. Different MacBook Pro can have different chip configuration. Each one is fabbed on a single chip. It means TSMC will need to produce different chips. If Microsoft cannot order large number, it will be costly for Microsoft to imitate. 
    williamlondonwatto_cobra
  • Reply 12 of 45
    danoxdanox Posts: 2,804member
    Microsoft has hired a key semiconductor designer away from Apple in an effort to expand its own efforts developing server chips, marking the second departure from Apple's chip team in recent weeks.

    Microsoft sign
    Microsoft sign


    Mike Filippo, who joined Apple in 2019, will reportedly work on processors in Microsoft's Azure group, Bloomberg reported Wednesday.

    The poaching hints that Microsoft could be accelerating efforts to build first-party server chips for its cloud computing services. The company's primary rivals, Amazon and Alphabet, are making similar moves.

    Before joining Apple in 2019, Filippo served as a top chip architect at Arm for around 10 years. Prior to that, he worked at Intel. During his tenure at Arm, he was credited with advancing the architecture's underlying technologies for mobile and other platforms, Bloomberg points out.

    As far as Apple is concerned, Filippo's departure marks the second high-profile chip engineer hired away by another company. Earlier in January, Intel poached lead Apple Silicon designer Jeff Wilcox.

    A report from late December 2021 indicated that Apple was taking steps to prevent poaching, including offering top engineering talent stock bonuses worth up to $180,000.

    Technology giants are increasingly looking to develop first-party chips as global supply constraints and semiconductor shortages loom overage the industry.

    Apple is further along in its first-party chip strategy than other companies. Back in October, it announced the M1 Pro and M1 Max, two Apple Silicon chips that are still leading the pack as far as performance as power efficiency.

    Read on AppleInsider

    Apple is thirteen years further along Hmm……the way you describe it Apple is six months ahead.
    williamlondonStrangeDayswatto_cobra
  • Reply 13 of 45
    IreneWIreneW Posts: 303member
    Microsoft may not be imitate Apple M! development. Different MacBook Pro can have different chip configuration. Each one is fabbed on a single chip. It means TSMC will need to produce different chips. If Microsoft cannot order large number, it will be costly for Microsoft to imitate. 
    As noted in the original article, this is not for use in laptops. The new CPUs are for the Azure servers.
  • Reply 14 of 45
    Gotta pay 'em to keep 'em. Competitors are hungry for top talent. 
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 15 of 45
    I'm pretty sure Apple's roadmap for the next 5-10 years is already well underway, meaning that the people leaving now are probably 'done' with their task.
    9secondkox2watto_cobra
  • Reply 16 of 45
    Curious as to makes him "key".
    9secondkox2watto_cobra
  • Reply 17 of 45
    GeorgeBMacGeorgeBMac Posts: 11,421member
    felix01 said:
    Gotta pay 'em to keep 'em. Competitors are hungry for top talent. 

    As Steve pointed out:  "A Players" don't chase money.  They chase challenges and an environment that supports their ability to create great things.  As with America's great industrialists:  the money was just a way of keeping score.

    Apple just poured a LOT of resources into a CPU for the low-profit Mac where it will take years if not decades to recover their investment while the product matures and incorporates itself fully into Apple's ecosystem.   So, most likely Apple is wisely pulling back from that high cost push -- and the A Players are headed out to where the action is.
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 18 of 45
    felix01 said:
    Gotta pay 'em to keep 'em. Competitors are hungry for top talent. 

    As Steve pointed out:  "A Players" don't chase money.  They chase challenges and an environment that supports their ability to create great things.  As with America's great industrialists:  the money was just a way of keeping score.

    Apple just poured a LOT of resources into a CPU for the low-profit Mac where it will take years if not decades to recover their investment while the product matures and incorporates itself fully into Apple's ecosystem.   So, most likely Apple is wisely pulling back from that high cost push -- and the A Players are headed out to where the action is.
    The core of that development is paid for by iPhone on day one. 

    The customizations aren’t going to take long to recoup. Inside one year. 

    The foundational milestones, like die to die interconnects and the all inclusive fabric will amortize over a couple years max and be around for a very long time. Apple has factored this into max pricing, particularly with custom builds. Apple doesn’t like to carry costs. That’s part of why there is an “Apple tax.” 

    Well worth it. 

    The sad part of these developers leaving is hat they probably weren’t happy at Apple. Be great to figure out why. But if it has to do with the “woke” philosophies, there isn’t much to do there. That’s Apple snd most engineers simply don’t buy into that. 

    Then again, maybe Srouji is a hard boss. He seems pretty strict (not wasting a single transistor) and that’s why Apple silicon is so good. 
    edited January 2022 maximarawatto_cobra
  • Reply 19 of 45
    thrangthrang Posts: 1,007member
    felix01 said:
    Gotta pay 'em to keep 'em. Competitors are hungry for top talent. 

    As Steve pointed out:  "A Players" don't chase money.  They chase challenges and an environment that supports their ability to create great things.  As with America's great industrialists:  the money was just a way of keeping score.

    Apple just poured a LOT of resources into a CPU for the low-profit Mac where it will take years if not decades to recover their investment while the product matures and incorporates itself fully into Apple's ecosystem.   So, most likely Apple is wisely pulling back from that high cost push -- and the A Players are headed out to where the action is.
    Or this guy is NOT an "A Player" and is thus a money chaser....

    There are a million reasons why a person joins or leaves any company... unless publicly stated, it's silly to draw conclusions...
    williamlondonStrangeDayswatto_cobra
  • Reply 20 of 45
    crowleycrowley Posts: 10,453member
    thrang said:
    felix01 said:
    Gotta pay 'em to keep 'em. Competitors are hungry for top talent. 

    As Steve pointed out:  "A Players" don't chase money.  They chase challenges and an environment that supports their ability to create great things.  As with America's great industrialists:  the money was just a way of keeping score.

    Apple just poured a LOT of resources into a CPU for the low-profit Mac where it will take years if not decades to recover their investment while the product matures and incorporates itself fully into Apple's ecosystem.   So, most likely Apple is wisely pulling back from that high cost push -- and the A Players are headed out to where the action is.
    Or this guy is NOT an "A Player" and is thus a money chaser....

    There are a million reasons why a person joins or leaves any company... unless publicly stated, it's silly to draw conclusions...
    Or: Steve Jobs was talking crap to justify the way he treated people.  In reality, people have a plethora of different motivations whether they're "A" Players, "B" Players, or whatever.  

    Devolving to a "not a true A Player" because a person doesn't conform to made up rules is dogmatic nonsense.
    ctt_zhmuthuk_vanalingamStrangeDays
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