Published in PC Hardware

Qualcomm unimpressed by Tegra 3

by on15 December 2011



No source of concern, S4 will win


Qualcomm seems unfazed by Nvidia’s quad-core Tegra 3 chipset and it believes upcoming Snapdragon S4 chips will be more than enough to keep up.

Although Nvidia is the only ARM player to develop and ship a 40nm quad-core, it seems the rest of the ARM crowd is not too concerned, despite the fact their 28nm quad-cores will ship a few months behind Nvidia.

Qualcomm Senior VP of Software Strategy Rob Chandhok stressed that Qualcomm’s strategy does not revolve around a “single instance” product like Tegra 3. Instead, Qualcomm focuses on driving a family of products designed for more flexibility, allowing Qualcomm to cover all market niches, from cheap single-core chips to multicore designs.

“You’re going to see hundreds of S4 devices in the market place. How many are going to have Tegra 3?” he said.

Of course, this is a valid point. Nvidia focused all its efforts on just two chips, rather than a comprehensive range. So, while Qualcomm has more than 300 design wins in the smartphone market alone, Nvidia has just a dozen, and those are Tegra 2 phones. Tegra 3 will find its way to a few phones, but it will be more successful in the tablet market. However, the Android tablet market is very, very small.

Rate this item
(0 votes)