Comment by jauntywundrkind
1 year ago
I keep hearing these kinds of claims but...
Qualcomm for years has sworn they didn't transfer the existing Nuvia tech. It's the Nuvia team, and a from scratch implementation. Qualcomm was saying pretty strongly they didn't allow any direct Nuvia IP to be imported and to pollute the new design.
They saw this argument coming from day 1 & worked to avoid it.
But everytime this case comes up, folks immediately revert to the ARM position that it's Nuvia IP being transfered. This alone is taking ARMs side, and seems not to resemble what Qualcomm tried to do.
>Qualcomm was saying pretty strongly they didn't allow any direct Nuvia IP to be imported and to pollute the new design.
Which is the part that is questionable and I guess no way to prove unless we continue with the trial. The Nuvia core is said to be perfect on A0, and no one in the industry has ever done anything perfect on A0, especially with something as complex as modern CPU design.
One could argue all the previous Nuvia Design IP were in the Nuvia's team's head memorised. They are basically recreating the same work done in Nuvia at Qualcomm. And that is I guess grey areas.
What did Qualcomm get from buying Nuvia it wouldn't have gotten from just hiring all Nuvia employees?
Edit: I guess it wouldn't be that simple to do
Acquihire's are very common. You can negotiate who is coming with you (or force getting the entire team and not just the A players), agreed to pay raises during the transfer, stock or other important roles, etc. Less unsettling for the employees too, having to go through the interview pipeline like a walk-in would.
Sometimes its the entire goal. Leave a company to fill a need it can't solve itself with the plan to get bought back in later.
Times have changed tho so who knows.
I thought that the gen 1 oryon cores were using Nuvia source, but the gen 2 cores were from scratch implementation.