SAN FRANCISCO: International Business Machines Corp. announced on Thursday
said it was designing a semiconductor for a consumer-electronics devices
connected to the Internet, that would address issues of "pervasive
computing."
The IBM PowerPC Internet Appliance Platform combines a microprocessor with
other capabilities such as touch-screen management, memory drivers and
liquid-crystal display drivers that will cost about $60, IBM said. The
announcement by IBM is in line with the trend in the chip industry to combine
multi-functions into one chip. This becomes possible as engineering advances
allow more and more transistors to be packed onto a single semiconductor.
IBM's Microelectronics division, based in N.Y., would assemble most of the
chip in advance for customers to help keep costs down, while the customers would
still be able to modify the chip themselves for specific applications. An IBM
spokesman said that Armonk, NY-based IBM, the world's No 1 computer maker, is
already working with about six Japanese consumer-electronics companies that are
planning to use the IBM chip in future products. The spokesman declined to name
the companies.
IBM said that current microprocessors designed for personal computers are not
flexible enough to lend themselves to practical use in battery-powered devices
that are connected to the Internet.
(C) Reuters Limited 2001.