Max A. Cherny
TAIPEI/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Taiwanese chip giant MediaTek is developing an Arm-based personal computer chip that will run Microsoft’s Windows operating system, according to three people familiar with the matter.
Last month, Microsoft unveiled a new generation of laptops with chips designed using Hand Holdings (NASDAQ:) technologies that provide enough power to run artificial intelligence applications are the future of consumer computing, executives say. The MediaTek chip is designed for this purpose.
The software company’s plans are aimed at Apple (NASDAQ:), which has been making its own Arm-based chips for Mac computers for about four years. And Microsoft’s decision to optimize Windows for Arm could threaten Intel’s (NASDAQ:) long-standing dominance in the PC market.
MediaTek and Microsoft declined to comment.
MediaTek’s PC chip will be released late next year after Qualcomm’s (NASDAQ:) exclusive deal to supply laptop chips expires, two sources said. The chip is based on off-the-shelf Arm designs, which can significantly speed up development since less design work is required using off-the-shelf, tested chip components.
It’s unclear whether Microsoft has approved the MediaTek PC processor for Copilot+ Windows.
Arm executives said one of its customers used off-the-shelf components to build a chip in about nine months from an off-the-shelf design, something MediaTek does not. Experienced chip design companies typically take significantly more than a year to create and test modern chips, depending on the complexity.
In 2016, Microsoft turned to Qualcomm to lead the transition of the Windows operating system to the core Arm processor architecture that has long been used in smartphones and their small batteries. Microsoft has given Qualcomm an exclusive deal to develop Windows-compatible Arm-based chips until 2024, Reuters reported last year.
As Qualcomm’s exclusivity agreement with Microsoft expires, other designers have decided to create chips that will help Microsoft leverage Arm’s designs. For decades, Windows machines have used chip architectures created by Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:) and Intel.
Nvidia (NASDAQ:) and AMD are working on an Arm design for Windows computers, Reuters reported last year. MediaTek is involved in the development of Nvidia’s PC chip, according to a person familiar with the matter. MediaTek’s work on the PC chip is not related to its collaboration with Nvidia, two of the sources said.