If you thought ARM had exhausted most of the potential licensees for its processor cores, think again - with revenues over $1bn, over $1bn cash to hand and a pool of 3,500 patents, the company is continuing to sign up new companies.
Over half the 22 companies that signed licenses with ARM in the last quarter were new customers, with 15 taking the Cortex-M embedded cores. ARM has now signed more than 200 Cortex‐M licences with over 150 companies, making it the largest product line in the company with 30% of unit shipments. Half of the 10bn devices shipped last year were outside of its traditional mobile market as microcontrollers and the Internet of Things starts to take off and its high end smartphone business slows. Embedded now makes up 32% of the business, compared to 46% for mobile.
The fallout from the splitting up of MIPS Technologies last year is also apparent.
AMR has bought the MIPS pool of 498 patents for $4m from the Bridge Crossing consortium, creating a library of 3,500 patents. ARM had originally paid $167m to form the consortium with Allied Security Trust to license the patents to third parties but the consortium decided not to go ahead with that licensing. ARM is now taking a £59.5m charge as a result. Imagination Technologies acquired the remaining 80 patents relating directly to the MIPS processors.
The fallout from the splitting up of MIPS Technologies last year is also apparent.
AMR has bought the MIPS pool of 498 patents for $4m from the Bridge Crossing consortium, creating a library of 3,500 patents. ARM had originally paid $167m to form the consortium with Allied Security Trust to license the patents to third parties but the consortium decided not to go ahead with that licensing. ARM is now taking a £59.5m charge as a result. Imagination Technologies acquired the remaining 80 patents relating directly to the MIPS processors.
ARM tops $1bn By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk
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