
Riding the RISC-V wave - lawrenceyan
https://semiengineering.com/riding-the-risc-v-wave/
======
masta
With Nvidia buying ARM, RISC-V might get a big push and investments from
parties who preferred the independence of the former ARM Ltd.

~~~
ernst_klim
Let's hope so. Although Nvidia could go full-blown openARM initiative, which
could effectively kill RISK-V.

~~~
dathinab
I expected Nvidia to first continue running ARM like it does now and then
slowly push ARM+Nvidea chips while _even more slowly_ hindering ARM+other GPU
chips.

The end goal would be to make ARM+other GPU technical viable but non copetive
so that most customers will have to buy ARM+Nvidea to be competive leading to
a hard to touch quasi monopoly of Nvidea for android phones (maybe except
cheap ones) and and embedded ML.

Oh and at some point they probably would restrict new "custom silicon"
contacts to prevent something like Apple silicon from happening again.

~~~
tw04
I guess call me skeptical. ARM+Nvidia GPU (Tegra) already runs absolute
circles around everything besides Apple. They didn't need to acquire ARM to
make a chip that's still superior to just about everything else on the market
5 years later.

I'm willing to bet this is entirely around controlling their own future, not
changing the way ARM is licensed. With Intel at least acting like they're
going to _REALLY_ try to enter the GPU space at this point, Nvidia needed to
acquire AMD or ARM to solidify their position. AMD was probably the preferred
path but divesting of the GPU business would've been difficult if not
impossible with all the embedded graphics chips they've put onto the market.
Plus I would imagine the IP pollution potential would open them up to lawsuits
from whoever acquired the GPU assets. And if Intel were to be the acquirer
(seems like the most likely suitor) - they'd actually have to be seriously
concerned about their GPU leadership.

~~~
klelatti
Sorry, but if ARM+Nvidia GPU already runs rings around everyone else besides
Apple and Nvidia already has access to all of Arm's IP (and there was no
threat of it losing that access) then why does it need acquire ARM to
'solidify' their position?

In reality it's not winning in the mobile SoC market and owning Arm will
enable it to hinder its competitors.

~~~
tw04
Because they want to own their own destiny? The same reason they could've
OEM'd Mellanox switches but chose to buy the company instead.

What exactly would their end-game be if ARM were acquired by say... a Chinese
firm who DID decide to end licensing terms. Then what?

~~~
klelatti
Arm was never going to be acquired by a Chinese firm - it would have been
blocked.

The problem is that controlling its own destiny gives it control over all its
competitors destinies too - and that's not good. I have nothing particularly
against Nvidia btw - the same issue would apply for any major SoC designer
buying Arm.

------
SemiTom
Interesting to see where this is gaining traction and where the challenges are
[https://semiengineering.com/where-risc-v-is-gaining-
traction...](https://semiengineering.com/where-risc-v-is-gaining-traction/)

------
pjmlp
I wonder how much wave it is going to be if we start getting RISC-V ISA
"distributions".

~~~
rstuart4133
About as successful as Linux I guess, which now powers the vast bulk of all
CPU's capable of running it.

Having Ubuntu on Desktops, RedHat on some corporate servers, Debian on others,
Pine in VM's, raspberian on rpi's, openwrt on routers, Android on mobile
phones, yada, yada, yada doesn't seem to have done Linux any damage. Quite the
reverse. It's almost certainly a major factor in Linux wiping the floor
against Windows. Microsoft doesn't have the manpower to turn Windows into
something that address all those niche's. While it's true Microsoft have
succesfully defended the desktop for now, they have in the mean time lost the
war on every other front.

~~~
pjmlp
Azure. And I bet Ubuntu will eventually be owned by Microsoft.

So basically that leaves IBM and Microsoft calling the shots what Linux is
supposed to be.

Plus in what matters in embedded space I will give about 10 years for MIT OS
like Azure RTOS and Zephyr to wipe the floor of GPL based Linux distributions.

~~~
shandor
Thanks for mentioning this.

Never heard of Azure RTOS before, but it seems MS went and bought Express
Logic. That's quite big.

But it doesn't seem to be MIT?

[https://github.com/azure-
rtos/threadx/blob/master/LICENSE.tx...](https://github.com/azure-
rtos/threadx/blob/master/LICENSE.txt)

~~~
pjmlp
Not sure, my point was that most companies are doing their best to avoid GPL
based OSes, going forward.

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phkahler
>> “Often people say, ‘Open source, it’s free.’ But it’s not free,” says
Dominic Rizzo...

It's Free as in freedom, not price. Think of it as unencumbered. Risc-v is not
open source like software, there are some open sorce implementations though.

~~~
rhn_mk1
What is not open source about RISC-V? As far as I can tell, there's the matter
of using a trademark, and the control of the project is not given to the
community.

But the specifications themselves seem free as in freedom (CC-BY-4.0):

[https://riscv.org/technical/specifications/](https://riscv.org/technical/specifications/)

~~~
dependenttypes
> and the control of the project is not given to the community.

They also have private mailing lists, but I agree, it is certainly FOSS.

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distantskeptic
I'm skeptical about RISC-V or any other open CPU design providing the quality
of commercial designs. Testing and verification is not free. ARM tests their
designs with millions of hours of simulation of heavy multithreaded workload,
and chip implementors would have done the same with the actual silicon.
Licensing costs of commercial ARM chips are a drop in the bucket compared to
this necessary expense to ensure reliability.

~~~
payne92
We've gone down this path with virtually every other bit of computing
technology: operating systems, databases, etc.

Open always wins....given enough time. No single company can compete with a
collective open ecosystem at scale.

~~~
beefhash
Open always wins, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it'll be
qualitatively better, which is what your parent comment seems to hint at.

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throwaway4good
One of the reason for the interest in RISC-V is the US-China tech war and the
US long arm banning of China's biggest tech companies access to ARM. However
RISC-V is dominated by US companies and even with some parts open source, it
will still be subject to sanctions.

A true alternative to ARM need to come out of China.

~~~
oytis
Well, I don't know, maybe the goal of RISC-V is not to make China happy? Just
an idea.

~~~
throwaway4good
Yep. And that's why these massive engineering companies that now are forced to
find ARM-alternatives are going to go for something else.

~~~
throwaway4good
Though the foundation did move to Switzerland for sort of this reason:

[https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-china-
semiconductors-...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-china-
semiconductors-insight/u-s-based-chip-tech-group-moving-to-switzerland-over-
trade-curb-fears-idUSKBN1XZ16L)

U.S.-based chip-tech group moving to Switzerland over trade curb fears

SAN FRANCISCO/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S.-based foundation overseeing
promising semiconductor technology developed with Pentagon support will soon
move to Switzerland after several of the group’s foreign members raised
concerns about potential U.S. trade curbs.

