The funniest part is that he licensed the RISC-V chip from SiFive, which is now part of Intel.
https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-failed-to-buy-sifive
0. https://www.semianalysis.com/p/arm-changes-business-model-oe...
RISC-V and Chinese chips are coming for ARMs lunch.
Seems like Arm is trying to close licensing loopholes.
The lawsuit states
"Nuvia's licensing fees and royalty rates reflected the anticipated scope and nature of Nuvia's use of the Arm architecture. The licenses safeguarded Arm's rights and expectations by prohibiting assignment without Arm's consent, regardless of whether a contemplated assignee had its own Arm licenses."
So Arm's case seems to hinge on whether or not the license language covering the prevention of assignment will be held up in court as applicable to this situation. That's the kind of legal dispute which will be very technical and not easy to speculate about... definitions of individual words and intent and all of that.
I didn't claim that ARM lacked a case. My point was that acquiring another company's license is not in and of itself a "loophole", a word I find to be heavily abused. As you mentioned, the language of the particular licenses will dictate the outcome of this case. But as ARM has not as yet made those terms clear to the public, the most one can do is look at past behaviors and rule out certain arguments. My evaluation may change as more information becomes available.
And given the circumstances, ARMChair analysis is entirely appropriate.
The original article and other media keeps painting it as some sort of revenge for not allowing Nvidia buying ARM. I dont even see how the two comes together when regulations and other parties are at play as well.
The main problem with this is going to be on mobile phones, where board space is at a steep premium. Other form factors that typically have multiple processors will probably be fine, though.
I can't imagine what ARM are thinking. It's been a competitive advantage over Intel for over a decade that SoC was easy to do with ARM, while it was almost impossible with x86, because of the way IP is managed in the x86 world.
You think that "competitive advantage" helped them any? It certainly didn't. They really want the PC and datacenter space. Apple has proven that alternative architectures aren't dead there, and Arm wants it.
Me personally? I hope this works. The ARM ecosystem as it stands today is horribly broken and promotes e-waste to an extreme degree. I am also under no delusions that RISC-V would be better at this.
RISC-V is already way better at this.
e.g.:
The early boot process (SBI) was standardized years ago, and widely deployed in current hardware.
Late boot process (UEFI on RISC-V) was standarized early this year, ahead of relevant hardware (servers, laptops, workstations).
ISA Profiles standard 2022 is in public review right now, and will likely be effective before the year ends. Hardware where this is relevant (e.g. SoC used in VisionFive2) already released this year is already compliant with the draft.
Future hardware will be widely compliant. Linux distributions and other operating systems target these profiles.
Relative to the utter chaos ARM has when it comes to these important topics, RISC-V is way ahead, being well prepared before the hardware floods the world.
For years Intel and AMD wanted Android on x86 to happen, and wanted embedded x86 to compete with ARM. It never happened because in small devices SoC is a requirement.
As transistor sizes shrink it becomes more and more insane to divide your system up into two or more dies just because some IP licensing requires it. ARM are swimming against the tide that lifted them for 20 years here.
They seem to be abandoning the embedded market that made them a huge success in favour of trying to enter a super competitive server market where they are only one of many players.
From https://www.semianalysis.com/p/arm-changes-business-model-oe...
The industry will simply speed up RISC-V adoption.
This is happening way later, with an industry that's already chosen to and taken steps to migrate to RISC-V, and thus is much better prepared to cope.
