NVIDIA winds down Icera modem business, open to selling it
NVIDIA has just announced that it will be giving up on its own modem efforts and that they are also open to selling its Icera modem unit.
Source: Anandtech.
NVIDIA purchased Icera in 2011 for around US$367 million in a bid to integrate modems into its Tegra chips. But unfortunately, things did not pan out in the way NVIDIA had in mind as its Tegra 4i SoC (with integrated Icera i500 modem) failed to score many major design wins.
As a result, NVIDIA has said that it will give up on manufacturing modem chips for mobile devices. Additionally, NVIDIA will "wind down" operations of its Icera unit by the second half of fiscal 2016, and that they are also open to the sale of Icera.
NVIDIA joins a growing list of players who have exited a market dominated by Qualcomm. Other companies who have stopped pursuing modem chips for mobile devices include Broadcom, Texas Instruments and FreeScale.
That said, even Qualcomm is feeling the pinch as its major customer, Samsung, is concentrating on creating its own chips for its mobile devices.
Finally, NVIDIA said that the company will continue to focus on graphics, gaming, automotive and cloud opportunities.
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