The Onward March of ARM
I’ve always kept a watching brief for ARM Holdings. Partly because it was local to where I lived, but mainly because one of the founders was Robin Saxby, who was in my year at Liverpool University.
I have just read this report in Forbes. There are some facts in that report, that will shape the world. Consider this abstract.
East (The ARM CEO) notes that by some estimates IT equipment now suck down 10% of the world electric power already; he also notes that there are estimates that in the next few years that the amount of data creates could increase 100x, or maybe 1000x. Even at 10x, he notes, we’re going to run out of power at the current consumption rates. “They are going to switch to ARM because it is all about the power,” he says. “The digital world is not going to become a reality unless servers and network infrastructure is designed in a different way….ARM is a tool in the toolbox for making this stuff more sustainable.”
Generation of electricity is one of the causes of global warming, as so much is generated by fossil fuels. So a small company in Cambridge will become a major player in the fight, just because its chip designs are so much more efficient.
Reading the Forbes article, says to me, that ARM can only get an awful lot bigger. But it is all about brain power and not about manufacturing in the traditional sense. On the other hand, ARM has been and will continue to be a company, whose technology enables other companies to start up in innumerable fields.
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