Kiran Bulusu’s Blog

Single chips have become a commodity and some chips just cost less than a dollar or some
consumer electronics centric chips like wireless/3g/ etc might cost less than 10$ depending
on the volume…a can of coke seems to be more expensive than some components today,
so in what form can the semi vendor can add value and get profits? where is the value chain now?

I believe the answer comes from the consumers itself. Many of the consumers now want a “system”
which can do multiple things and not just specific functionality..If you translate into semi world,
its essentially “system on chip” and ITS the Software which is driving this value chain and will continue
for couple of more yrs I think..Look at product/architecture offering of picochip,Bitwave Semiconductors  or Qualcomm MSM7200 ..they are not just chips ,they are already “systems” aka “chipsets” . All the configuration/reconfiguration etc is all done via software. More and more apps via SW are developed using the development platform these vendors provide, the real value that’s driving the innovation seems to be coming from SW…

May be I didn’t have enough coffee today yet , but if any of the readers disagree or has anything to share, I would love to hear your perspective as well…