Cell en el 2004

Exactamente para qué lo van a usar, no lo sé, pero...

12/16 20:51
Toshiba Will Begin Making `Cell' Chip in 2004, Executive Says
By Yoshifumi Takemoto

Tokyo, Dec. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Toshiba Corp. will begin commercial production of a radically new processor designed with Sony Corp. and International Business Machines Corp. as early as 2004, an executive at Japan's largest chipmaker said.

The chip, called ``Cell,'' will be made at a new chip plant Toshiba will build in Oita prefecture, in southern Japan, Toshiba Vice President Yasuo Morimoto told reporters attending a yearend gathering on Monday. Toshiba said Friday it will invest 350 billion yen ($2.9 billion) on the Oita plant and another for flash- memory chips it will build in Mie prefecture.

Dubbed a supercomputer on a chip, ``Cell'' is a departure in design because it combines so many functions on a single piece of silicon. The chip may be used in Sony's next video-game console, as well as a host of other consumer electronics, such as a new generation of slimmer, more powerful cellular phones. Elements of the chip's design may also be used in IBM's server chips.

``Cell'' is an outgrowth of an agreement reached in April by Toshiba, Sony, the world's largest maker of video-game consoles, and IBM to collaborate in a four-year project to find ways to produce smaller, less power-hungry and faster chips on 300- millimeter (12-inch) silicon wafers.

Larger wafer sizes may reduce production costs by as much as 30 percent compared with standard 200-millimeter wafers, analysts and investors estimate.

Toshiba, in collaboration with Sony and IBM, wants to develop microprocessors capable of handling moving pictures broadcast over the Internet.

The ``Cell'' chip may give the partners an edge over rivals such as Intel Corp. because it adopts an entirely new chip design developed by engineers at the three companies to specifically handle complex graphics, Morimoto said.

``We have an edge because Intel may find it difficult to abandon the architecture of their current microprocessors,'' Morimoto said, adding Intel's processor designs favor computer- centered applications, rather than graphics.

Morimoto expects the two new plants Toshiba announced Friday, both of which will use 300-millimeter production technology, to each cost between 100 billion yen and 200 billion yen.

The Tokyo-based company, which had 311 billion yen in cash as of Sept. 30, will fund the projects using money earned from operations. Still, Toshiba would ``welcome investment from partners,'' Morimoto said.

To share costs, Toshiba will ask Sony to invest in the new Oita plant, the Nihon Keizai newspaper reported earlier.


Fuente: encontrado en beyond3d y de
http://quote.bloomberg.com/fgcgi.cgi?T=marketsquote99_relnews.ht&s=APf6DDBRkVG9zaGli