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Monday, December 03, 2012, 07:31 pm
Rumor: Apple hiring former Texas Instruments chip engineers in Israel
In a bid to expand its chip-making business in Israel, Apple has reportedly hired a number of former Texas Instruments engineers living in the country, with the new employees said to bolster the tech giant's research and development resources in the region.
People familiar with Apple's developing Israel-based operations told The Next Web that the company has been hiring "dozens" of engineers to work in the cities of Haifa and Herzliya, the latter of which being the home base of purchased the flash memory maker in December of 2011.
The sources went on to say that Apple is picking up former TI employees who were laid off in a culling of 250 jobs at the company's Ra'anana location, which itself is part of a larger global workforce cutdown of around 1,700 employees. According to TI Israel's website, the Ra'anana campus was responsible for wireless connectivity solutions like WiFi, Bluetooth and GPS and OMAP products. OMAP, or Open Multimedia Applications Platform, is a type of system-on-a-chip developed by the Texas-based company currently being used in portable devices like Amazon's Kindle Fire HD.
Apple in April was reported to be gearing up for a major hiring campaign to fill spots at its Israel R&D center located in Haifa's Scientific Industries Center, which boasts a collective of high-tech companies like Google, Intel and IBM. The recent TI Israel hires won't be the first for Apple, as former Deputy CEO Etai Zaitsman is said to be working on the Haifa initiative headed up by Aharon Aharon, a veteran of Israel's tech industry.
In May, AppleInsider discovered a number of listings on Apple's job board for SoC engineers located in the Haifa and Herzliya Pituah regions of Israel.
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Another small step toward the inevitable Intel-free Apple future.
Intel Core i7: $1000.
Apple A6X: $17.50.
Do the math.
Another small step toward the inevitable Intel-free Apple future.
Intel Core i7: $1000.
Apple A6X: $17.50.
Do the math.
You already know those aren't feasible numbers.
You already know those aren't feasible numbers.
True, but if you can also look at it this way. An Intel Core i7 3610QM starts for $378. Since Apple buys large volumes, let's just put it $300 for comparison sake. The Intel part is 160 square millimeters. That is roughly $1.88 per square millimeter in die area.
If you look at the A6, it is 96.71 square millimeters for a total cost of $17.50. That is $0.18 per square millimeter, or about a factor of 10 cheaper.
True, but if you can also look at it this way. An Intel Core i7 3610QM starts for $378. Since Apple buys large volumes, let's just put it $300 for comparison sake. The Intel part is 160 square millimeters. That is roughly $1.88 per square millimeter in die area.
If you look at the A6, it is 96.71 square millimeters for a total cost of $17.50. That is $0.18 per square millimeter, or about a factor of 10 cheaper.
This is comparing apples (no pun intended) to oranges. Intel's process advantage right now is almost one whole node in front of everyone else. If they made A6 on Intel's latest process, it would probably run 1.5 times faster and use 75% the power.
Furthermore, Apple isn't paying R&D costs when it is purchasing those chips from Samsung. Intel has to factor in the price of the billions it spends on R&D when it sells the i7-3610QM.
Finally, if Intel made 3610QMs at the volumes that Apple uses A6s, the price would be far less than $300 since the marginal cost of each additional chip is quite small.
Israel is a pretty nasty country to do business with. If they are going to start using Israeli manufacture for any significant portion of their product they definitely will lose some customers and a lot of public goodwill.
How would Apple it's largest single costumer not be paying for Samsung R&D through the price it pays. How else is it being paid?
How would Apple it's largest single costumer not be paying for Samsung R&D through the price it pays. How else is it being paid?
That's like saying I'm paying for Apple's R&D cost when I buy a song on iTunes Store. Sure, a fraction of their total profits get put into R&D and you can use that same ratio to figure out what portion of that $1.29 is going for R&D but that's not what he stated.
Apple isn't paying Samsung for R&D, they are paying them for production of R&D that Samsung has already worked out. You can contrast this to Apple having to invest in their chip production or Apple investing billions with LG to get them to R&D Retina displays.
Israel is a pretty nasty country to do business with...
Here we go...
Here we go...
I don't see anything wrong with his comment. His focus was on doing business in the country, not with the people. There are clearly some countries that are easier to do business with than others. I personally don't have any experience in this area but I've read about various laws that affect business in negative and positive ways. I would like to hear more specifics about his comment though.
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