Intel Unveils New Atom Processors

While announcing to the world that it has inked a deal with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company for the co-manufacturing of Atom CPUs, Intel also introduced a new Atom Z5xx-series processor. According to the giant chip maker, there are four “unique” new versions of the chip heading our way.

Under normal circumstances, this would be only an announcement regarding the launch of new chips, yet this time Intel says that these processors are targeted at mobile phones. Until now, Intel's Atom models were aiming at MIDs (mobile Internet devices), or Internet devices, yet these are the first Atoms to go for what the company calls “media phones.”

It is still uncertain at the moment how many smartphones will actually feature the new Atom processors. For the time being, it seems that they are not yet able to meet the smartphone battery-life requirements, which means that we might have to wait for the next version of Atom, which is called Moorestown, to come to the surface.

Moorestown is expected to hit the market late this year, if not at the beginning of the next. The processor will come with lower power requirements than currently available Atom chips, will be more highly integrated and is also stated to be able to meet smartphone battery-life requirements. Many of you might already know that Moorestown is expected to be included in a future LG Electronics handset. In addition, it seems that the Santa Clara company also plans to include the chips in embedded industrial applications, as well as in in-car infotainment devices.

As for the outsourcing of the fabrication of Atom processors to TSMC, we learn that it will be only a partial one. The memorandum of understanding (MOU) the two companies announced includes a collaboration on addressing technology platform, intellectual property (IP) infrastructure, and System-on-Chip (SoC) solutions.

Intel is set to “port its Atom processor CPU cores to the TSMC technology platform,” a move that involves processes, IP, libraries, and design flows. Through this collaboration, Intel hopes to expand Atom SoCs availability for the company's customers, as the integration with SMC’s diverse IP infrastructure will provide a wider range of applications.