I don’t spend as much time keeping track of consumer tech these days, but I stumbled on an interesting article on Apple’s new A7 that got me to dig a bit more:
- Apple Insider: After its disastrous Exynos 5 Octa, Samsung may have lost Apple’s A7 contract to TSMC – a surprisingly wide-ranging/in-depth article on Apple’s chip developments w/ some interesting speculation in the second half
- SemiAccurate: Apple’s silicon design capabilities increase – an interesting report from January on Apple’s buildout of CPU/GPU resources (also from SemiAccurate, a report that Apple has bought into a chip fab recently – more rumors)
- The Most Forward Thinking Apple Yet – interesting speculations
While in the short-term there have been more last-minute leaks from components suppliers, and it may be a losing battle, it looks like Apple is attacking strategic leaks by increased vertical integration: building/buying a fab may only be the first step (keeping in minde that Apple has over $100B in offshore cash).
Plastic cases are one thing, but it’ll be interesting to see how secret Apple can keep its AppleTV and iWatch developments. I think it’s fair to expect the former may end up attacking the living room/XBone a lot more directly than past efforts, and the latter will have a pretty big personal sensing/informatics component. These are both things that are pretty untapped markets for Apple that would benefit from a 360 ecosystem.