14 DAY TRIAL // Even though NVIDIA's mobile SoC is one of the more powerful ARM solutions for tablets and smartphones on the mobile market right now, it appears that smaller makers of such products will have to pass it up.
The Tegra 2 system-on-chip from the Santa Clara, California-based GPU maker has been described as a highly feature-rich mobile platform and was adopted by several tablets already, like the Advent Vega.
This would normally prompt a great many companies of all sizes to place orders in the hopes of propelling their business upwards by means of a new smartphone or tablet.
Unfortunately, this does not seem to be a possibility, because only bigger companies will have access to it.
This isn't because NVIDIA refused to collaborate with less known product makers, but because of the policy it has when it comes to orders.
Apparently, the outfit is not accepting any orders smaller than 100,000 Tegra 2 units, even though many developers kept asking the company for smaller quantities throughout 2010.
In other words, companies the likes of LG and Motorola probably got more than 100,000, or so Fudzilla seems to believe.
On the other hand, smaller players like Point of View and a many others will probably not get around to launching a Tegra 2 products because they can't afford to order so many units at once.
Considering that NVIDIA will need to sell million of SoCs if it wants the platform to return a profit, one might end up questioning this tactic.
On the other hand, if it gets some loyal customers, the GPU maker may achieve its objective as it will periodically send out batches of 100,000 Tegra 2 processors.
What remains to be seen is if this marketing move pays off or if NVIDIA finds itself in the position where it needs to reconsider its options.