Broadcom

Three major Apple suppliers have submitted preliminary bids for Toshiba’s flash chip business

In the coming weeks, Toshiba will unveil a final decision concerning selling a majority stake in its lucrative memory business. Bloomberg reported this morning that iPhone manufacturer Foxconn’s preliminary bid for Toshiba’s semiconductor unit is valued at a whopping $26.93 billion. According to Bloomberg’s sources, that amount is in part to force negotiations, using a bid that’s too high to ignore.

Apple supplier Broadcom getting out of Wi-Fi chip business

Fabless semiconductor company Broadcom is looking to phase-out its Wi-Fi chip-making business, according to industry sources who spoke with Taiwanese trade publication DigiTimes. Broadcom is currently Apple’s top supplier of Wi-Fi chips used in Macs, iPhones, iPads and iPods so it looks like the Cupertino firm might be forced to find a new supplier soon.

Broadcom designs its own products but contracts out actual silicon production to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (TSMC), which also builds Apple-designed application processors for iOS devices.

Broadcom releases SDK with support for Apple’s home automation HomeKit platform

Chip maker Broadcom, which supplies Wi-Fi and Bluetooth chips for Apple products, on Tuesday announced a software development kit that supports HomeKit, Apple’s home automation platform supported across iPhone, iPod touch and iPad devices running iOS 8.

The announcement is the strongest indication yet that Apple has granted full HomeKit certification to Broadcom’s hardware developer platform. It ensures that upcoming Internet of Things (IoT) home automation devices will be able to seamlessly connect with the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.

Apple poaching Broadcom talent as rumors of in-house baseband chip development intensify

Following talk of Apple’s rumored initiative that would have it develop its own baseband chips for 2015 iPhones and iPads in-house, AppleInsider has learned the firm’s recently poached a pair of longtime semiconductor engineers from chipmaker Broadcom.

Both men are experienced at building RF hardware and have led the effort to produce baseband transceivers used by Nokia and Samsung devices.

Apple counts Broadcom as its supplier: the iPhone 5s uses a Broadcom touchscreen controller and the handset’s Wi-Fi chip by Murata is based on Broadcom’s BCM4334 module, according to a teardown analysis by repair experts over at iFixIt…

Broadcom launches Gigabit Wi-Fi chip that will likely power the next iPhone

Imagination Technologies, the fabless British semiconductor maker, yesterday at Mobile World Congress detailed its new PowerVR graphics which outperforms Nvidia’s Tegra K1 platform and is a likely candidate for the next iPhone’s GPU. And now, another premium silicon vendor has announced a chip that could just as easily find its way into future iOS devices.

I’m talking about Broadcom, whose Wi-Fi chips and other controller components are used in the iPhone 5s and iPad lineup. The Irvine, California based firm announced at Mobile World Congress a new fifth-generation 802.11ac Wi-Fi component which doubles data throughput and increases Wi-Fi coverage by up to 30 percent.

Should Apple choose to tap it, the iPhone 6 and the next iPad will adopt Gigabit Wi-Fi aka 802.11ac, the latest and greatest standard in wireless networking for the consumer market…