William Gallagher
To power its Apple Intelligence servers, Apple is now said to be at least in part working with Broadcom on a new processor design.
Apple makes much of how Apple Intelligence works on-device, but it's also clear that there are requests that need use of a greater Large Language Model. Such requests are sent to Apple's servers, and the company has been working to produce server processors specifically for this purpose.
According to The Information, that work includes a partnership with Broadcom to make a processor codenamed Baltra for release in 2026. Reportedly, this does not mean Broadcom designing and producing the new processor, but possibly only providing one of several "chiplets.".
A processor's functions could be split up into several chiplets which Apple later recombines into a single chip. That would reportedly reduce manufacturing complexity, but also mean Apple could keep its overall design confidential, even from partner firms.
It's not certain why Apple would want to partner with Broadcom when it is already developing its own Apple Silicon processors. However, AI servers may need many processors working in tandem, and Broadcom could be working on the networking between them.
Reportedly, Apple cancelled the development of an unknown high-performance processor for Macs, in order to divert engineers to this AI server chip. The engineers in question are based in Israel.
It's claimed that those engineers were instrumental in the move to Apple Silicon.
Baltra, named after one of the Galapagos islands, is expected to be manufactured by TSMC using its N3P process. Announced in April 2024, the technology is expected to be first seen in the processors for the iPhone 17 Pro.
Separately, it's previously been reported that Apple is in talks with Foxconn to build Apple Intelligence servers in Taiwan.
Wesley Hilliard
Christine McKee
Malcolm Owen
Amber Neely
6 Comments
Could this high performance processor be the m-Extreme rumored chip? Or even the older rumor Apple Silicon dGPU?
Chiplets have been seen as the way forward for cost effectively delivering high performance chips at scale in less complex designs for a few years now.
For server side hardware things like the interconnect technologies are also vital.
Apple has not typically played in this area so looking outside is logical and Broadcom already has a lot of work under its belt for Apple so could be an ideal candidate for some areas.
Then there is the runtime environment and all the other software considerations.