Xiaomi to take a shot at processor market with Rifle chip

[Jeff Causey]

According to sources in Korea, Chinese manufacturer Xiaomi plans to reveal a new initiative to start producing their own mobile device processor chips. A component partner of Xiaomi indicates the processor is named “Rifle” and will be revealed at a company event scheduled to take place in May, likely the launch of the Xiaomi Max and Mi Band 2 on May 10th. The development of an in-house chip by Xiaomi is consistent with a rumor we first heard in late 2015. With the initial launch of a Rifle processor, Xiaomi is believed to be focusing on the budget phone market, so don’t expect to see a Xiaomi chip in any flagship devices any time soon.

In markets like China or India, manufacturers see a significant portion of the market dominated by budget handsets. However, consumers are demanding more and more features from these low and mid-tier devices. In order to keep costs down and deliver the experience expected by the market, more companies are turning to in-house production of the main processors in mobile devices. Samsung, Apple and Huawei all produce their own chips for use in at least part of the product portfolio and LG is reportedly getting ready to launch their own processor line. On top of these phone manufacturers, Qualcomm and MediaTek continue to work on maintaining their own market share as a major producers of processors.

Recently Qualcomm reduced the amount of royalties that they charge for other producers who use their design and technology to produce processor chips. Even with that reduction, Xiaomi is still looking for cost reductions. Besides moving production for some chips in-house, Xiaomi reportedly will use a license from ARM on the new Rifle chip.

Although an announcement is expected in only a couple weeks, no other details about the Rifle processor are known, like when an actual product may ship with an in-house produced chip.

source: The Korea Times
via: Android Authority


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