[Sirened]

++, totally. I think a lot of people are linking CPU engineering with SW engineering because they both work with the same product at the end of the day, but the industries are radically different both from a business and culture standpoint. The "go fast and break things" mentality that pervades the SV software startup scene is, in my experience, no where to be found in hardware because it's both incredibly costly to make any mistakes and because most CPU divisions are lead by people with decades of experience (rather than the mishmash that is startups).

The author's argument here about talent leaving after having "gotten Apple off x64" is such an odd take. It's not as if Apple started designing these chips after the M1 launched—the pipeline for even small SoCs is often five or more years. The bit about Rivos is especially bizarre because that company was founded in 2021, well after this chip must have been taped out.

[somethoughts]

Yep - also was going to add but it was getting kinda long...

With respect to Rivos, reading the about page - it seems an interesting take on RISC-V.

My take is that this will be rolled back into either Apple or Google at a later date - mostly as a hedge against someone (like Nvidia) acquiring the ARM IP now that its in play - or to provide some realistic alternative that can be used as a counter bid in licensing discussions with ARM.

Two of the founders of Rivos were involved in PA Semi which was acquired by Apple and Agnilux which was acquired by Google ChromeBook team.