News Qualcomm Adopts RISC-V for Next-Gen Snapdragon Wear Platform

[Admin]

Qualcomm and Google partner to bring RISC-V to wearables.

Qualcomm Adopts RISC-V for Next-Gen Snapdragon Wear Platform : Read more

 

[Findecanor]

To me, this smells as if Qualcomm's motive is not much more than to avoid paying royalties to ARM for their in-house developed cores.

In the last couple of weeks, Qualcomm has posted a proposal for RISC-V extensions that closely mirror some in ARM's instruction set, while also asking that RISC-V's compressed instructions (which 64-bit ARM does not have) be excluded from application profiles. That indicates that they could have a core design originally made to run ARM code that they are converting to run RISC-V — in the cheapest way they can get away with.

 

[ikjadoon]

So how real is that lawsuit? IIRC, Arm cancelled (or is attempting to cancel) Qualcomm’s Arm architectural licenses.

Arm’s Nuclear Option – Qualcomm Must Cancel Next-Generation Products If Arm Succeeds

Arm denies allegations of changing its business model

www.semianalysis.com

//

Qualcomm has traditionally ignored smartwatch SoCs for years, so I’ll be quite eager to see a regular cadence.

Perhaps these will be based on the “Little Phoenix” cores they bought with NUVIA?

Would love to see custom RISC-V primary compute cores shipping in a mainstream device this decade. Ideally, x86 and Arm will improve or lose, if ISA competition works.

 

[ekio]

Good to hear.
riscv needs to take off. We live in a world where too many ISA are chained property of greedy companies. That needs to change. Even if it’s qualcomm helping. At least we can expect from them some good implementations and some marketing traction. I wish they were targeting smartphones too but that will come when brands discover they can reduce cost and offer better battery life.

 

[JamesJones44]

So how real is that lawsuit? IIRC, Arm cancelled (or is attempting to cancel) Qualcomm’s Arm architectural licenses.

Only the license that is related to NUVIA processors. Not Qualcomm as a whole.

 

[ikjadoon]

Only the license that is related to NUVIA processors. Not Qualcomm as a whole.

It's Qualcomm's original architecture license as well.

Arm claims it already terminated NUVIA's Architecture License Agreement / ALA, but because Qualcomm claimed NUVIA's IP is now backed by Qualcomm's original ALA, now Qualcomm's original ALA is also at risk. From Arm's updated response to Qualcomm:

240. ... Arm denies any suggestion that this document waived Arm’s rights, prejudiced Qualcomm, or otherwise constituted an acknowledgment of or conferred on Qualcomm any rights to technology developed under the Nuvia ALA, since Qualcomm agreed in March 2021 to Arm’s condition that “such interaction and/or assistance does not expressly or impliedly waive any of Arm’s rights with respect to the novation,” and the Compliance Waiver was issued under the implementer ID corresponding with Nuvia’s ALA rather than Qualcomm’s ALA. ...

250. Paragraph 250 contains legal conclusions to which no response is required. To the extent a response is required, Arm denies the allegations in this paragraph because, among other things, Qualcomm is materially breaching its ALA, giving Arm the right to terminate, and the Qualcomm ALA does not provide a license for or right to continue development of the Nuvia technology.

In Arm's eyes, seemingly, any NUVIA IP is "excommunicado" for any ALA, be it Qualcomm or others. If Qualcomm is now trying to use its own ALA to ship NUVIA, Arm will cancel that ALA for using "breach of license IP". That seemingly means Qualcomm may no longer have an active Arm ALA (which is OK for consumer, IIRC, as Qualcomm uses a separate TLA to license Cortex cores).

Now, Arm says it has the "the right to terminate" Qualcomm's original ALA (that Qualcomm licensed from Arm before buying NUVIA) and not that Arm will terminate.

Qualcomm seemingly acknowledged the NUVIA ALA is dead, so the lawsuit is revolves whether Qualcomm's ALA is sufficient.

 

[JamesJones44]

It's Qualcomm's original architecture license as well.

Arm claims it already terminated NUVIA's Architecture License Agreement / ALA, but because Qualcomm claimed NUVIA's IP is now backed by Qualcomm's original ALA, now Qualcomm's original ALA is also at risk. From Arm's updated response to Qualcomm:



In Arm's eyes, seemingly, any NUVIA IP is "excommunicado" for any ALA, be it Qualcomm or others. If Qualcomm is now trying to use its own ALA to ship NUVIA, Arm will cancel that ALA for using "breach of license IP". That seemingly means Qualcomm may no longer have an active Arm ALA (which is OK for consumer, IIRC, as Qualcomm uses a separate TLA to license Cortex cores).

Now, Arm says it has the "the right to terminate" Qualcomm's original ALA (that Qualcomm licensed from Arm before buying NUVIA) and not that Arm will terminate.

Qualcomm seemingly acknowledged the NUVIA ALA is dead, so the lawsuit is revolves whether Qualcomm's ALA is sufficient.

Per my understanding this would only be triggered if Qualcomm went ahead and shipped Nuvia based processor (or something that looked like a NUVIA based processor).

I don't think ARM is preemptively trying to terminate Qualcomm's Architecture license based on what I've read. Instead ARM is trying to force Qualcomm to pay for a new license that includes Nuvia based designs or scrap them altogether. Which is why I mentioned it's related to Nuvia.

 

[bit_user]

while also asking that RISC-V's compressed instructions (which 64-bit ARM does not have) be excluded from application profiles.

Isn't that the basic idea behind Thumb?

ARM architecture family - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

I know it's been deprecated, and I believe even dropped from ARMv9-A.

That indicates that they could have a core design originally made to run ARM code that they are converting to run RISC-V — in the cheapest way they can get away with.

Whether or not they're trying to repurpose existing IP, I can understand not wanting to have to complicate instruction decoders with a whole new mode, especially if you're targeting higher performance levels.