According to a report from Economic Daily News citing The Wallstreet Journal, Apple is rumored to be developing its own AI chips tailored for data centers, which could potentially give the world’s top smartphone seller a crucial advantage in the AI arms race. The report, quoting sources familiar with the matter, stated that Apple has been working closely with its chip manufacturing partner TSMC to design and produce these chips in the primary stage. However, it is still unclear whether the final version has been produced yet.

It is suggested that Apple’s server chips may focus on executing AI models, particularly in AI inference, rather than AI training, where Nvidia’s chips currently dominate.

Over the past decade, Apple has gradually become a major player in chip design for products like iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, and Mac. The latest project involving Apple chips for data center servers, internally named “Project ACDC” (short for Apple Chips in Data Center), will integrate Apple’s IC design capabilities into the operation of clients’ servers, sources said.

The project has been in operation for several years, though the timetable for launching this server chip remains unclear. Apple is expected to unveil more new AI products and AI-related updates at its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in June.

An Apple spokesperson declined to comment on the reported developments.

According to reports from Wccftech on April 23rd, Apple is said to be working on a self-developed AI server processor using TSMC’s 3-nanometer process, with plans for mass production expected in the second half of 2025.

AMD benefited from AI demand last quarter (January to March), with revenue of USD 5.47 billion, surpassing Wall Street expectations and turning a profit compared to the same period last year. However, this quarter’s fiscal forecast and market outlook are not as expected.

AMD achieved a net profit of USD 120 million last quarter, with an adjusted EPS of USD 0.62, surpassing Wall Street’s expected USD 0.61. AMD expects revenue for this quarter to be between USD 5.4 billion and USD 6 billion, with a midpoint of USD 5.7 billion, a 6% increase from the same period last year but slightly below Wall Street’s expected USD 5.73 billion.

After enduring a downturn in the semiconductor industry, AMD finally returned to profitability last quarter, largely due to strong sales of its MI300 series AI chips, which drove revenue in the data center division to grow by 80% year-on-year to USD 2.3 billion.

As per a report from the Wall Street Journal, AMD CEO Lisa Su stated that since the launch of the latest MI300X chip at the end of last year, sales have surpassed $1 billion, with major customers including Microsoft, Meta, Oracle, among other tech giants.

In January, Lisa Su had forecasted that AMD’s AI chip revenue for this year could reach USD 3.5 billion, which was recently revised upwards to USD 4 billion. The AMD MI300 series chips are seen as direct competitors to NVIDIA’s H100 chips. However, NVIDIA announced its new generation AI chip architecture, Blackwell, in March this year, forcing AMD to accelerate its pace. Lisa Su stated that AMD is already developing the next generation of AI chips.

AMD’s client division, which sells PC chips, has also benefited from the AI wave, with revenue increasing by 85% year-on-year to USD 1.4 billion last quarter, once again proving the recovery and growth of the global PC market. AMD’s chips for PCs are capable of executing AI computations locally, targeting the increasingly expanding demand for AI-enabled PCs.

Regarding the applications of AI PCs, Su previously stated in an interview with Sina that she found communication, productivity, and creativity particularly exciting. Many applications are still in their early stages, but she expects to see more developments in the coming years.

However, AMD’s businesses outside of AI chips are facing increasing challenges. Revenue from the gaming console chip division declined by 48% year-on-year to USD 920 million last quarter, falling short of Wall Street’s expectations of USD 970 million. Additionally, the revenue from the embedded chip division, established after AMD’s acquisition of Xilinx in 2022, also decreased by 46% year-on-year to USD 850 million last quarter, similarly below Wall Street’s expectations of USD 940 million.

TrendForce previously issued an analysis in a press release, indicating that the AI PC market is propelled by two key drivers: Firstly, demand for terminal applications, mainly dominated by Microsoft through its Windows OS and Office suite, is a significant factor. Microsoft is poised to integrate Copilot into the next generation of Windows, making Copilot a fundamental requirement for AI PCs.

Secondly, Intel, as a leading CPU manufacturer, is advocating for AI PCs that combine CPU, GPU, and NPU architectures to enable a variety of terminal AI applications.

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(Photo credit: AMD)

Qualcomm is actively entering the AI PC market with a new processor unveiled on April 25th, reportedly featuring Arm architecture and produced on a 4nm process, igniting a new battle in non-x86 architecture AI PC processors.

Industry sources cited by the report from Economic Daily News have anticipated that TSMC is behind this new chip from Qualcomm. Following this trend, major players like Apple, NVIDIA, and MediaTek will continue to release Arm-based AI PC processors, all likely manufactured by TSMC.

Since 2018, Qualcomm has introduced a series of chips like Snapdragon 8cx, 7c, 8c platforms, 8cx Gen 2, and 8cx Gen 3, targeting always-connected and mobile PC domains. After years of preparation, they’re capitalizing on the AI wave, with last year’s launch of Snapdragon X Elite, produced on TSMC’s 4nm process. Yesterday, they further expanded with Snapdragon X Plus, aiming for a larger share of the AI PC market.

Qualcomm claims both Snapdragon X Elite and X Plus feature customized integrated Oryon CPUs, outperforming competitors with 37% higher CPU performance and a 54% reduction in power consumption. During last year’s Snapdragon Summit, Qualcomm introduced its in-house Oryon CPU, claiming that certain CPU performance metrics surpassed those of Intel and Apple chips.

Qualcomm previously mentioned that part of the Snapdragon X Elite’s GPU performance also surpasses competitors like AMD. Both Snapdragon X chips feature Hexagon neural network processors (NPU) capable of 45 trillion operations per second (TOPS), promising unprecedented performance, energy efficiency, and on-device AI capabilities for more Windows PCs.

Qualcomm emphasizes that the NPU’s performance supports new AI-optimized applications and features, including OBS Studio real-time captions, leveraging on-device Whisper functionality to instantly translate 100 spoken languages into 100 languages for live broadcasts.

According to Qualcomm’s official website, the Snapdragon X Elite features 12 cores with a maximum multi-thread frequency of 3.8 GHz, while the Snapdragon X Plus has 10 cores with a maximum frequency of 3.4 GHz.

Industry sources cited by the same report from Economic Daily News believe the Snapdragon X Plus will help Qualcomm capture the PC mainstream market. Qualcomm stated that OEMs are expected to launch PCs equipped with Snapdragon X Plus and Snapdragon X Elite starting from mid this year.

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(Photo credit: Qualcomm)

According to sources cited by the American news outlet Business Insider, Microsoft plans to double its inventory of GPUs to 1.8 million, primarily sourced from NVIDIA. Having more chips on hand will enable Microsoft to launch AI products that are more efficient, faster, and more cost-effective.

The source does not detail specific future applications for these chips, but acquiring a large quantity of chips means that Microsoft can extensively deploy them across its own products, including cloud services and consumer electronics.

The sources cited by the same report further revealed that Microsoft plans to invest USD 100 billion in GPUs and data centers by 2027 to strengthen its existing infrastructure.

Microsoft’s significant stockpiling of AI chips underscores the company’s efforts to maintain a competitive edge in the AI field, where having robust computing power is crucial for innovation.

On the other hand, NVIDIA recently stated that the AI computer they are collaborating on with Microsoft will operate on Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform and will utilize tens of thousands of NVIDIA GPUs, including their H100 and A100 chips.

NVIDIA declined to disclose the contract value of this collaboration. However, industry sources cited by the report estimate that the price of each A100 chip ranges from USD 10,000 to 12,000, while the price of the H100 is significantly higher than this range.

Additionally, Microsoft is also in the process of designing the next generation of the chip. Not only is Microsoft striving to reduce its reliance on NVIDIA, but other companies including OpenAI, Tesla, Google, Amazon, and Meta are also investing in developing their own AI accelerator chips. These companies are expected to compete with NVIDIA’s flagship H100 AI accelerator chips.

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(Photo credit: NVIDIA)

Amid escalating tensions in the US-China tech war, rumors cited in reports from The Wall Street Journal and CNBC suggest that China has instructed major local telecom companies to gradually replace foreign chips by 2027, with Intel and AMD as the primary targets.

Sources cited in the same reports reveal that China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has instructed several major local telecom operators to phase out foreign chips used in core telecommunications infrastructure by 2027. This move is expected to impact both Intel and AMD. Regarding this matter, CNBC reports that Intel declined to comment on the report, AMD didn’t respond to a request for comment, either.

It has been reported that Chinese authorities have ordered state-owned telecom operators to inspect their networks for extensive use of non-Chinese manufactured chips and to replace them before the deadline.

In the past, China has attempted to reduce its reliance on foreign chips but has faced obstacles due to a lack of high-quality locally produced chips. However, telecom operators now have more local alternatives for procurement, suggesting that the quality of Chinese-made chips may have become more stable and reliable.

Sources cited in the same reports indicate that this move will have the most significant impact on Intel and AMD, as most of the core processors used in Chinese and global networking equipment come from these two tech giants. However, the exact extent of the impact is still unknown.

On the other hand, a previous report from the Financial Times also indicated that, to refrain from using PCs and servers equipped with microprocessors from Intel and AMD, China implemented new regulations in December of last year requiring government agencies at the county level and above.

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(Photo credit: iStock)