Samsung closes US processor development division
Samsung closes part of its processor development division in America. As a result, 290 employees will be laid off. It is unclear what this development means for the production of custom CPUs by Samsung. The closure will be final from December 31.
To date, smartphones from the South Korean manufacturer partly use CPUs that Samsung manufactures itself and cores that the company develops itself. Over the past weekend, Samsung announced that it will lay off 290 employees from its CPU development divisions, Austin American-Statesman writes. These are employees of the advanced computer lab in California and the R&D division for processors in Austin, Texas.
It is unknown what this means for the socs that Samsung will use in its smartphones in the future. The company may switch to Arm’s Cortex designs for cores. Currently, the manufacturer uses Mongoose cores in its CPUs, which are based on the architecture of Arm, but with its own adjustments. The company has not yet made any official statements about a possible switch to Cortex cores. Closing the CPU division would also “have no impact on the semiconductor factory in Austin,” Samsung reports. The production of current Exynos models will therefore continue for the time being.
Earlier this year there were already rumors about a possible closure of the CPU divisions of Samsung. Speculation about this came from, among others, @UniverseIce, who more often releases tech information and already stated in August that Samsung should close its CPU team. A little over a month later suggested the Twitter user that the company will actually do this, which has now been confirmed. He also stated that the company will use Arm’s core designs, but this seems to be speculation for now.
Earlier this year, Samsung announced that the company would partner with AMD to produce fuel-efficient smartphone GPUs. These GPUs should be released in 2021. Samsung recently announced its Exynos 990-soc with support for 108-megapixel cameras and 120Hz screens.