At last month's TI Developer Conference, TI convened a panel discussion featuring some of its top management. This panel addressed a broad range of topics such as TI's plans for its architectures and the changing competitive landscape. One of the most interesting topics discussed was the growing competition between Intel and TI. Intel has made no secret of its intent to wrest the market for handheld wireless devices from TI. Although TI holds the lead in cell phones, Intel has established itself as the one to beat in PDAs; what will happen as these markets converge?
Alain Mutricy, Vice President of the Wireless Terminals Business Unit, argued that Intel is not yet a major competitor in the wireless space because it lacks TI's expertise in analog and RF circuitry, power management, and wireless system design. As Alain sees it, this gives TI a one- to two-year lead over Intel in wireless applications. Although Intel may lack some types of wireless expertise, it does have advantages in other key wireless technologies. For example, Intel is a leading provider of flash memory, whereas TI does not have its own line of flash memory.
Doug Rasor, Vice President of Strategic Marketing, stated that TI has a significant performance advantage over Intel and complained that Intel is “running the PC strategy playbook [with a] focus on MHz.” Doug said that TI's customers report that TI's OMAP outperforms Intel's XScale despite the fact that XScale runs at twice the clock speed. Ironically, TI itself has a reputation for hanging performance claims on clock speed rather than on meaningful benchmarks. The real catch for TI is that handheld wireless devices—like PCs—are marketed not to benchmark-savvy engineers but to consumers who are easily impressed by big MHz numbers.
Greg Delagi, Vice President of TI's DSP Group, admitted that Intel's resources are enviable. However, he pointed out that Intel must expand its business model before it can challenge TI. Although Intel seems to be committed to this very strategy, it is not clear that its recent efforts have pushed the company forward. For example, the cellular baseband chipsets Intel gained from its acquisition of DSP Communications still use TI DSPs. And Intel's nearly two-year-old collaboration with Analog Devices has yet to result in a single Intel product announcement. In contrast, TI has successfully expanded its product lines with its acquisitions of companies like analog chip vendor Burr-Brown.
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