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Nokia declines to go all in on chips

Nokia declines to go all in on chips

By New York Times | Updated: 6 June 2012 12:36 IST

Highlights

One might think Nokia would give into the temptation. It sees Apple vacuuming up adoration and profits. It sees Apple taking more control of the components that go into a phone. In particular, Apple has worked on building its very own chip for smartphones

One might think Nokia would give into the temptation.

It sees Apple vacuuming up adoration and profits. It sees Apple taking more control of the components that go into a phone. In particular, Apple has worked on building its very own chip for smartphones and tablets and has acquired chip companies apace.

Perhaps Nokia too should be harboring silicon dreams. But Henry Tirri, the head of Nokia's research centres, says it is not interested.

"You can do for a while an investment like Apple is doing on their own processor stack and aim for very optimized performance," Mr. Tirri said during an interview at the company's Silicon Valley lab. "But that is very brittle."

That would be Nokia passing on the prospect of a homemade chip as one means of invigorating its cellphone lineup.

Mr. Tirri has worked in the computer science field for about 40 years and dresses the part of a Silicon Valley local. Sparkly earring, hair tumbling down his temples, a white embroidered shirt, cream pants and sandals scream anything but "icy Finn."

He knows the chip industry's patterns well and has seen specialists capitalize on their wares for short periods of time, only to be undone in spectacular fashion when more general-purpose products come to town.

"It seems to be that Moore's Law will always end up leaning toward commoditization and a faster, general-purpose chip," Mr. Tirri said.

Nokia could use a shot in the arm, but finding that boost through a homemade chip is just too risky. Any manufacturing miss or misstep on features needed in a given generation of products can leave you waiting two or three years to catch up.

"You have to be very good at predicting things or you can kill yourself in one cycle," Mr. Tirri said.

Apple, for one, appears convinced that the specialist may enjoy a solid run here in the next few years as mobile devices undergo great change. The company continues to use Intel chips in its more traditional computers but concocts its own take on the ARM design for mobile devices.

The custom work can lead to snappier performance with software, better battery life and smaller products but comes with heavy financial and engineering costs.

Away from chips, Nokia has a few surprises in store for customers as its research bets pay off, Mr. Tirri said. The company has specialists working on advances in materials that could result in phones that change color, deflect liquids and grow keyboards out of their displays. In addition, Nokia is working hard on a variety of cloud computing and network optimization services.

Mr. Tirri referenced "My Fair Lady," a favorite musical from his childhood, and said Nokia would delight again.

"Just you wait, Henry Higgins," he said. "Just you wait."

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Nokia declines to go all in on chips

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