Mobile Unleashed: The Origin and Evolution of ARM Processors in our Devices

Description

This is the origin story of technology super heroes: the creators and founders of ARM, the company that is responsible for the processors found inside 95% of the world’s mobile devices today. This is also the evolution story of how three companies – Apple, Samsung, and Qualcomm – put ARM technology in the hands of billions of people through smartphones, tablets, music players, and more. It was anything but a straight line from idea to success for ARM. The story starts with the triumph of BBC Micro engineers Steve Furber and Sophie Wilson, who make the audacious decision to design their own microprocessor – and it works the first time. The question becomes, how to sell it? Part I follows ARM as its founders launch their own company, select a new leader, a new strategy, and find themselves partnered with Apple, TI, Nokia, and other companies just as digital technology starts to unleash mobile devices. ARM grows rapidly, even as other semiconductor firms struggle in the dot com meltdown, and establishes itself as a standard for embedded RISC processors. Apple aficionados will find the opening of Part II of interest the moment Steve Jobs returns and changes the direction toward fulfilling consumer dreams. Samsung devotees will see how that firm evolved from its earliest days in consumer electronics and semiconductors through a philosophical shift to innovation. Qualcomm followers will learn much of their history as it plays out from satellite communications to development of a mobile phone standard and emergence as a leading fabless semiconductor company. If ARM could be summarized in one word, it would be “collaboration.” Throughout this story, from Foreword to Epilogue, efforts to develop an ecosystem are highlighted. Familiar names such as Google, Intel, Mediatek, Microsoft, Motorola, TSMC, and others are interwoven throughout. The evolution of ARM’s first 25 years as a company wraps up with a shift to its next strategy: the Internet of Things, the ultimate connector for people and devices. Research for this story is extensive, simplifying a complex mobile industry timeline and uncovering critical points where ARM and other companies made fateful and sometimes surprising decisions. Rare photos, summary diagrams and tables, and unique perspectives from insiders add insight to this important telling of technology history. Mobile Unleashed-cover-front.pdf Mobile Unleashed - interior - rev1.pdf Foreword Prologue Challenging the Mainstream More Than a Cool Idea Chapter 1: RISC-y Business Computers for Everyone Reversal of Fortunes Fast, for an 8-bit Machine If You Can’t Join Them … ARM1: A Chip is Born Chapter 2: Working it Out Olivetti Rides Into Town How to Dabble in Business Computers It’s Not Easy Being Different ARM2 Catches the Tube Cloners Take Control Withering Fire from Workstations ARM3 Plows Ahead Chapter 3: Writing on the Wall Opening the Apple Door Friends in the Neighborhood Best Strategy Available Applying for College Navigating Toward a Vision Keeping Up Appointments Overpromise and Underperform Style, Substance, and Saxby Chapter 4: In the Right Hands Floating-Point for Acorn, ARM6 for Apple Pocketing the Newton, Seeking $3T Two Failures in Recognition Cell Phone Zero 1G Rolls Across the Globe Fight for a 2G Future Licensed to Process Dealing for DSPs Thumbing the Way Ahead Chapter 5: Coming on Strong Custom Chips, ARM7, and a Star Fall of Hobbit, Rise of Consulting StrongARM and ARM7TDMI Arrive Adoption and Advancing Processes ARM8, SA-110, and a new EPOC RISC Leaders, Windows CE, and Loyalty Symbian, Nokia 6110, and ARM9TDMI Hijacking and Brinksmanship Solid Profits and Momentum Chapter 6: Making the Cortex-A List ARM’s IPO, and ARM10 Original Partners Part Ways Foundries, Investments, Extensions Smartphones Come, Holdouts Go Thriving in a Meltdown XScale, ARM11, and OS Contenders AMBA 3, TrustZone, MIPI, and a Gift MPCore, NEON, and “The Keynote” ARMv7, Cortex-A8, and Android Calm before Disruption Chapter 7: From Cupertino … Better Call Steve Design and Digital Dreams You’re Doing It Wrong, Here’s an iPod ROKR Phones You’ll Never Buy “Project Purple” and the iPhone Faster Networks and Faster Chips Now Serving Number 4 Namaste, and a “Swift” Response “Cyclone” and The 64-bit Question Calling the Shots in Fabless Chapter 8: To Seoul, via Austin Considering All Aspects Developing DRAMs Mountains in the Way New Management, Fired Up Finding Digital Footing An Unprecedented ARM License For a Few Flash Chips More Smartphone Sampler Your Loss is Our Foundry On Second Thought, Android Works Exynos Takes Over the Galaxy Avoiding the Zero-Sum Game Chapter 9: Press ‘Q’ to Connect Actual Rocket Scientists Linked to San Diego Programming the Modem “Let’s Do It Again” Space Truckin’ Just Keep Talking Get In and Hang On Roadblock at Six Million Detour for Better Cores “Scorpion”, “Hexagon”, and Gobi “Krait”, Tiers, and an A/B Strategy What Comes After Phones? Chapter 10: An Industry in Transition Early Exits for Big Names Break Glass in Case of Fire Pounding the Tablet Asian ARM Fusion Plunder and Pillage The Atom Contra Affair Restocking the Shelves Reigniting Mobile Innovation Wearables and the IoT Changing the World with One Chip Epilogue Endnotes About the Authors.pdf About the Authors Mobile Unleashed-cover-back.pdf