Mediatek, Starting To Make Cloud Server Chips, Too?

Mediatek is going to roll over this time? At Computex, Mediatek announced that it has joined the Arm Total Design Alliance (Arm Total Design Alliance) and received a NeoversecSS license from Arm.

The license is Arm's solution offering for data centers, edge computing and high performance computing (HPC). Mediatek obtained the authorization, which means that the company officially entered the cloud server field after AI mobile phones and automotive electronics, and opened a new growth area.

After entering the cloud server market, Mediatek may become a partner of NVIDIA and participate in the design of the next generation Rubin architecture. In addition, in terms of AI PC, Morgan predicted that the WoA PC chip developed by Mediatek and NVDA will be unveiled at CES in January next year.

Cloud server service

Mediatek believes that by 2028, the custom ARM-based server CPU TAM will reach $5 billion, while the custom AI accelerator will reach $40 billion.

At present, Mediatek's AI layout is mainly involved in the field of AI mobile phones and automotive electronics. The acquisition of Arm's NeoversecSS authorization marks Mediatek's official entry into the cloud server field. Morgan believes that after Mediatek enters the cloud server market, it will become a partner of NVIDIA and participate in the design of the next generation Rubin architecture. At Computex, NVIDIA's CEO mentioned that the company's approach to working with Mediatek is mainly through providing IP and allowing Mediatek to work on IP-based development. Morgan said that this collaborative approach to IP development may mean "ASIC+GPU hybrid design." Therefore, Mediatek is expected to participate in the design of NVDA's next-generation Rubin architecture. In order to further support this prediction, Mo mentioned that AIchip, also a Taiwanese chip designer, previously revealed that the 2nm AIchip is very complex and involves a variety of chip designs. This is in line with the "CPU+GPU+HBM+ network and high-speed interface" Rubin multi-chip architecture released by NVIDIA two days ago. In addition, Mo mentioned that Mediatek's cooperation with Google is also worthy of attention. Although the design performance is not ideal, the current Mediatek has not passed the verification of Google, and the TPU order was accepted by Broadcom. But market rumors suggest Mediatek is looking at the possibility of ordering the next three nanoTPUV7 chips. Finally, in the AI server market space, Mediatek revealed its own views. Mediatek predicts that TAM, an AI-customized chip, will reach $45 billion by 2028, a figure that exceeds Morgan's forecast of $37 billion. Mediatek further added that by 2028, the custom ARM-based server CPU TAM will reach $5 billion, while the custom AI accelerator will reach $40 billion.

AI mobile phone business

Unlike the layout of the cloud server, Mediatek's AI layout in the mobile phone business is very clear. Mobile phone business accounts for 61% of Mediatek's total revenue, and it is also a business area that Mediatek has been deeply laid out. Two newly released chips for AI mobile phones: • Tianguet 9300: for high-end, released in November 2023, supporting the AI large model running up to 33 billion parameters on the mobile side; • Tianguet 8300: for the mid-end, released in November 2023, up to support 10 billion parameter AI large language model; Compared with Qualcomm Snapdragon 8Gen3 and Apple A17 Pro, which are also smart phone SoC giants, Mediatek Tianji 9300 has advantages in power consumption although its overall performance is slightly lower. According to the news recently revealed by the technology blogger mobile chip master, the power consumption advantage of Mediatek's next-generation Tianguet 9400 still exists. At the same time, the company also revealed that Honor's next-generation flagship will be equipped with the Tianguet 9400 SoC.However, competition from Qualcomm will be more intense.

AI PC

Morgan Stanley forecasts that Mediatek +NVIDIA WoA PC chips will ship 5 million units in 2025 and 15 million units in 2026. Due to the current WoA exclusive agreement between Microsoft and Qualcomm, Qualcomm will remain the only supplier of ARM cpus for Microsoft's Windows systems until the agreement expires this summer. Perhaps for this reason, Nvidia and Mediatek have yet to announce their new WoA PC chips at Computex. But the market still sees the huge potential of NVIDIA+ Mediatek WoA PC chip, Morgan predicted that the WoA PC chip may be announced at CES in January next year, and expects the chip will be launched in the second half of 25 years. Considering the successful launch of Microsoft's WoA Surface notebook and Copilot app, Morgan Stanley forecasts MediaTek+NVIDIA WoAPC chips to ship 5 million units in 2025 and 15 million units in 2026. In addition, based on supply chain verification, we found that the WoA PC chip launched by Mediatek will use ARM Cortex-X5 core and use TSMC's 3nm process, and the performance is stronger than expected. Given that the chip is combined with Nvidia's excellent graphics processor, Morgan Stanley expects the chip to cost $300, which would be higher than Qualcomm's X Elite ($230). It is worth noting that several PC Oems have already shown interest in future products from NVIDIA and MediaTek.