Imagination unfazed by Samsung's Mali move

LONDON — Graphics core licensor Imagination Technologies Group plc (Kings Langley, England) has stated that it expects to have continued success with Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., despite the latter's uptake of graphics from archrival ARM Holdings plc (Cambridge, England).

Samsung and ARM announced on Monday (Feb. 15) that they were entering into a long-term strategic agreement for Samsung to use ARM's Mali graphics architecture across its system-on-chip (SoC), ASIC and foundry businesses.

"We have a strong relationship with Samsung LSI and also Samsung Mobile. We expect these relationships to continue to develop further. We also expect significant volume to be generated through these ongoing partnerships," an Imagination spokesman told EE Times.

One of the most significant design wins is for Imagination's PowerVR series of graphics core, which have been integrated with ARM processor cores inside the main application processor for the Apple iPhone. It is believed that the PowerVR MBX is present in the first iPhone, while the iPhone 3GS contains a PowerVR SGX core.

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