The quest for end-to-end control of its production line may soon lead Apple to dump Intel chips and move towards in-house processors based on the A14 variant that is expected to power the next iPhone.
Bloomberg reported that the company would launch three Mac processors based on the above chip and would use Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company which is the same firm that is responsible for making processors for the iPhone and iPads, to build the new Mac chipsets.
The change could happen in 2021
The report says that if all goes to plan, the first Macbook featuring the new chip could be out as early as next year.
If the move does fructify, it would finally mean that Apple's long cherished dream of having total control of its products, including hardware and software, would finally be fulfilled. The company has stated time and again that having total ownership makes it possible to obtain better performance and quality customer experience.
In the past, the company had also indicated that owning the entire supply chain could bring in cost benefits that boost the bottom line or can serve as investments towards enhancing design elements. Over the past couple of years, Apple has already made this transition with the iPhone and the iPad models so it may not really be a shocker for Intel that the company would dump its processors.
Why the change?
The report suggests that the first Apple-designed chips would come with 12 cores and would be based on ARM architecture instead of the x86.
What immediately strikes is that such an approach could enhance battery life and improve mobile connectivity even more. Of course, there is always the challenge of ARM-based hardware on the processing capacity compared with the x86 processors.
The question that this also brings forth is whether Apple would stick with the macOS or would there be some surprise tucked away in some corner? Logic suggests that it would stay put as moving to the ARM-based processors would simply the process of offering applications and software that flow between the iPhone, iPad, the laptop and the PC-sized screens.
