Nov.

2011

Competitive Analysis :

AP, Modem 1-chip vs. 2-chip

Hanjo Kim, Ph. D. Senior Engineer (hanjo007.kim@samsung.com) Youngmin Kim, Principle Engineer (youngmin421@samsung.com) Taehoon Kim, Vice President (taehoon1@samsung.com) System LSI Business Samsung Electronics

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1. Introduction
Over the past several years, mobile devices, particularly smartphones and tablet PCs, have expanded their position in the mobile computing market. Its clear that these devices will play a major role in the post-PC era. Critical to the success of these types of mobile devices is implementing the right combination of application processor (AP) and cellular modem. For OEM vendors, two types of solutions are available today: a dual-chip solution with discrete AP and modem components or a single-chip solution with the AP and modem integrated together into a single chip. To date, the concept that a single-chip solution is more cost effective and competitive than a dual-chip solution has been the industry norm. It is here to challenge that notion and to suggest that a dual-chip solution is the better option for advanced, next-generation smartphone and tablet devices. With a fast growing feature list and performance boosts, its important for system-level designers to evaluate different AP and modem combinations rather than just assuming that the single-chip solution is the only option. This paper offers a competitive analysis of single-chip vs. dual-chip solutions by revealing the highperformance/low-power advantages for smartphone and tablet designs.

2. Competitive Analysis
When evaluating the competitiveness of a single-chip vs. a dual-chip solution, manufacturing costs, flexibility and time-to-market benefits need to be examined in addition to selecting the right silicon technology for the AP and modem.

2.1 Solution Flexibility and Time to Market

For smartphone and tablet OEM device manufacturers, selecting the right AP and modem combination is a key factor in determining the overall success of a product. Discrete dual-chip solutions offer better flexibility than a single-chip solution in the dynamically changing and diverse smartphone and tablet markets. Depending on the target market and application, OEMs need to choose the AP/modem option that best suits their particular needs. Because AP and modem chips are on different development timeframes and product life cycles, it can be difficult to provide a single-chip solution that offers the best leading-edge technology for both parts. The demand for high-performance APs in the competitive smartphone and tablet markets is steadily increasing, pushing a much faster product life cycle. To remain competitive, OEMs dont have a choice but to design their products using the latest AP available that powers access to applications and services consumers are looking for. Conversely, the product life cycle for modems is entirely different. Increasing data usage due to the rapid growth of smartphones and tablets requires a faster network infrastructure such as LTE. Changes in modem technology usually take years due to enormous amounts of investment and timeconsuming efforts surrounding the deployment of new communications equipment on a global scale. Additionally, bringing a new modem to market takes considerably longer due to the intensive certification process, which affects the overall design and development of a single-chip AP/modem solution for mobile smart devices. With a much longer development time for the single-chip solution, there is a risk that the AP portion of the solution will not be as cost competitive as a discrete AP would be in a mobile device. If smartphones and tablets designed on a single-chip solution cannot provide a lower cost point than the dual-

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chip solutions, there is no compelling reason for the OEM to use a single-chip solution in their products. Device manufacturers would end up competing on lower price, hurting their overall business profits. To establish leadership in the high-end, high-margin mobile device market, dual-chip solutions offer OEMs a better opportunity to gain marketshare in their particular market segment.

2.2 Manufacturing Cost Aspect

Figure1. Yield changes as a function of gross die or chip size Figure 1 shows how yield is affected as a function of gross die or chip size. As shown in Figure 1, there is a point where yield drops dramatically as the chip size increases or gross die decreases due to the nature of the silicon process technology. Below is point, when the number of gross die is decreased due to the increase die size, yield drops off quickly. With the number of functional die decreasing, manufacturing costs are amplified significantly. To maintain manufacturing costs at an acceptable level, the die needs to stay within a particular dimension. From this illustration, the potential cost-reduction benefits from a single-chip solution would be cancelled out by yield loss when the resulting single-chip design is bigger than the optimal chip size indicated in Figure 1. Despite advances in process technology, APs are growing in size as a result of higher performance requirements and a growing feature list. Modems are also increasing in size to support 2G/3G LTE and more. The burden of supporting LTE tends to enlarge the size of the modem dramatically. With both the AP and modem growing in size, the overall footprint of an integrated singlechip solution can be well over the optimal size point shown in Figure 1, making it financially unattractive for commercial application.

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Figure 2 compares manufacturing costs, including packaging, and other related costs that impact overall die size in a single-chip vs. dual-chip solution. Die size for a single-chip solution is typically reduce by 3 to 9%, eliminating common blocks. Package cost savings in a single-chip solution is approximately 4 to 8% of a dual-chip solution. When calculating area vs. cost, the point of the dual-chip solution line should compare with the point of the single-chip solution line. The point of the single-chip line pointed with consideration of % size reduction and is from 3 to 9%.

Figure2. The correlation between Area and Manufacturing Cost for AP, modem 1-chip solution and AP, modem discrete 2-chip solution According to Figure 2, the AP/modem single-chip solution with % size reduction has a higher manufacturing cost than a discrete dual-chip solution. Despite the packaging cost reduction of the singlechip solution, a decrease in yield will result in higher manufacturing costs. Conventional wisdom says that designing a single-chip solution from existing AP/modem components is more cost effective than a dual-chip solution. This simply isnt true anymore with the AP and modem chips available today.

2.3 Application of Advanced Process Technology

Silicon process technology is advancing rapidly to meet the high performance and low power requirements for todays mobile semiconductor products especially for smartphone and tablet applications. The best case scenario would be to apply the most advanced process technology for both the AP and the modem simultaneously to maximize the process benefits. Unfortunately, considering the lengthy certification process for modem components, its difficult to apply the latest process technology for both

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parts. Given that APs and modems are on different development paths, choosing an AP developed on the most advanced process technology allows OEMs to design-in a processor that has the best performance with low power consumption. Additionally, thanks to new technology such as chip-to-chip interface, AP and modem dual-chip discrete solutions no longer need additional memory on the modem side and can offer the same memory BOM cost compared to a single-chip solution.

3. Conclusion
This paper has shown that discrete AP and modem chips offer better solution flexibility, faster timeto-market and lower manufacturing costs in high-end smartphones and tablets.

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