intel heads back to Programmable Logic !

jmg

via a buy-out, of course, and being intel, not a small buyout either !!

["Semiconductor giant Intel Corp. is already in talks to acquire rival Altera Corp., the Wall Street Journal reported Friday. "]

Not too surprising, as intel have been FAB for some Altera FPGAs since 2013 (and they also do Achronix FPGAs, not sure what this does to Achronix stock price ? )

However, are intel nimble enough to manage a FPGA company ? - or is the sector now mature enough that fresh new ideas are not a risk ?

ozpropdev

IIRC Intel were already manufacturing Altera's Stratix 10 FPGA's in their 14nm process.

Maybe they have big plans for their new 10nm process

Cluso99

Wouldn't this require government approval?
IMHO I don't think this is good for us all.

jmg

Cluso99 wrote: »

Wouldn't this require government approval?

Why ?
intel has been quietly making some Altera FPGAs for a while now, and I expect that was certainly nudged along by the US Government, considering the alternative of too much dependence on Taiwan Fabs, was altogether too scary for them.

Cluso99 wrote: »

IMHO I don't think this is good for us all.

Time will tell, hopefully very little may actually change.

Maybe intel was about to become one of Altera's larger customers ?

This move also has intel back making ARMs ...

Tor

Well, Altera has in the last few years started to add ARM cores to their FPGAs (or at least that what the endless stream of emails from Altera say). I can't imagine Intel is happy with that. So if they buy Altera I expect that to be replaced with Atom cores (well they don't call them Atom but that's what they're based on). Is that good or not? (from the consumer or hobbyist point of view)

jmg

I doubt they will replace ARM, that work is already done,
Even a x86 core is unlikely, but would be interesting if done right.
Intel used to be very big in embedded controllers and still uses the 8051 internally.