Qualcomm makes ARM servers “a reality” at 10nm

Qualcomm’s first 10nm server processor is also ARM’s first 10nm server processor and an indication that at last the mobile processor specialist is being taken seriously in the server processor market.

Qualcomm server ARMv8

In 2017 and ARM executive in the CPU business told me the server business will become important for the processor IP firm within two years. Maybe he got it right.

The chip, the Centric 2400, is build around Qualcomm’s custom ARMv8-compliant CPU called Falkor. It has up to 48-cores and is fabricated on a 10nm FinFET process technology.

Qualcomm built on its experience of bring 1onm mobile Snapdragon processors to market, and it called doing the same for ARM-based server processors a “monumental achievement”.

It will be hoping that a combination of ARM’s clear power efficiency and its large embedded design ecosystem will influence server designs as it did mobiles. It’s still a big ask, but some are now believing it may happen.

Only this week ARM bolstered its server software tool ecosystem with the acquisition of Aline Software, a specialist in analysis tools for maximising software efficiency in high performance computing (HPC) systems.

Last month, Socionext, the Matsushita-Fujitsu SoC joint venture, introduced a server processor with 24 ARM Cortex-A53 cores.

Anand Chandrasekher, general manager of Qualcomm Datacenter Technologies business clearly believes it is now time to move power efficient ARM-based servers “from concept to reality”.