Three former Apple executives - part of the team that created the CPU found in the iPhone, iPad and soon the MacBook - have managed to raise a staggering $240 million with a startup called Nuvia.
The tiny CPU firm hopes to replicate the same resounding success in the data center, using the ethos that drove the team to create what is arguably the most powerful mobile processor family in the world.
Based on Arm technology, the new chip is expected to challenge more traditional players in the data center arena, some of which are also based on Arm (e.g. Ampere Altra/ Marvel Thunder), as well as AMD EPYC and Intel Xeon.
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Nuvia
According to Reuters, the funding round was led by Mithril Capital, which has very close ties with Facebook, one of the world’s biggest users of data center processors.
Only a few days ago, Arm announced two new CPU designs - Neoverse V1 and Neoverse N2 - which aim to deliver better per-thread performance than the competition.
However, after Arm was acquired for $40 billion by Nvidia, Nuvia’s CEO has confirmed that the company is evaluating other options as an alternative to Arm IP. RISC-V, for example, has been gathering momentum ever since it went open-source, with backing from Facebook, Google and IBM.
Apple connection
The Apple-Nuvia thread can’t be dismissed though; Apple acquired three different silicon companies (Passif, Intrisity and PA Semi) in order to build the A-series processor.
There’s no reason it wouldn’t buy a fourth to help produce the kind of server processors that, like Amazon’s Graviton, are fine tuned to service Apple’s needs - especially since the launch of new subscription service Apple One.
We know Apple has likely been doubling down on data center investment, despite record spending slumps on CAPEX, and that the company may be interested in launching a search engine and privacy services, including a VPN.
The company also operates a cloud storage service and we wouldn’t be surprised if it launched a series of new offerings, such as a website builder.
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