World’s largest fabless chip designer, American company Qualcomm is used to design its own mobile CPUs and their respective integrated graphics processing units (iGPU). We know that the company’s famous Snapdragon processors are based on the ARM architecture, but the designs are original.
Many other ARM CPU makers usually license the graphics IP from companies like Imagination Technologies or ARM.
Qualcomm is making its own iGPUs also and the architecture inside the Adreno series has nothing to do with ARM and everything to do with AMD instead.
The Adreno architecture was initially developed by AMD, and Qualcomm has just bought the entire mobile division form the Texan company.
Even today’s Adreno iGPUs are based on AMD’s mobile DirectX 9 designs from back in the day. Qualcomm is reportedly having problems in designing a satisfactory DirectX 11 architecture, and the company is looking at AMD for the solution.
Rumors say that the fabless giant might go so far as buying AMD, but we’re having a hard time believing that.
Even so, considering that AMD’s ex graphics CTO, Mr. Eric Demmers is now Qualcomm’s main graphics guy, there is the possibility of a future collaboration between the two companies.
