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by Kevin (Kilmo) Kang, Korea

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Interview with Intel's Pankaj Kedia @ Computex 2009

Jun 11, 2009 09:56

During Computex 2009, Intel announced the new "Ultra-thin" category to differentiate with Netbooks which currently use one of its mainstream CPU Atom chipes. Besides this, ARM-powered Linux Netbooks were unveiled at Computex based on the Qualcomm Snapdragon, TI and Nvidia Tegra. Those products will be released from Q3, which means you will have various options to purchase Netbooks or MIDs from the third quarter of this year. For example, you can get a combination something like: Intel Atom + WinXP or Intel Atom + Moblin or Snapdragon + Linux or Snapdragon + Android, and more to come.

You may be getting curious about the latest situation in the Netbook and MID market which Arm has been trying to get into, driven by Intel's Atom. Well, last week, I went to Taiwan to attend Computex Taipei and had the good luck to get a 1-on-1 interview with Pankaj Kedia from Intel during the tradeshow. Kedia is director of ecosystems for Intel's ultra-mobility group, and is known as a key person for MIDs.

With Intel's Pankaj Kedia at Computex Taipei 2009.

I'd like to share what I discovered during the interview with Pankaj. Do understand that the topics I asked may focus on the situation in Korea and colored by my own personal views. I had a few concerns regarding Intel's recent decision on the OS selections for its Atom and Moorestown platforms, which are the next-generation platforms we have all been waiting for.

Q1. Why is Intel focusing on the Moblin OS rather than MS' Windows OS for its Atom and Moorestown platforms?

I think association of the Intel chipset and MS Windows OS is the best thing that differentiates with ARM-based Netbooks and MIDs which getting the spotlight during Computex 2009, such as Qualcomm's Snapdragon and Nvidia's Tegra-based Netbooks and MIDs. All those devices are based on the Android or Linux operation systems because of cost-efficiency issues but also because of lack of support from Microsoft. (This was also confirmed by Steve Guggenheimer, Microsoft's corporate VP for original equipment manufacturers during his interview at Computex).

Intel seems to have let those challenges emerge even though it has enough of a shield to have avoided this competition from the starting point.

Kedia was quite confident on this issue for the following reasons.

Even though Qualcomm and Nvidia are announcing their Arm-based Netbooks and MIDs at Computex, he doesn't think this challenge is a a problem as there are different points of view on this developing situation. Kedia came up with some examples.

1. Smartphone

95 percent of people use smartphones for three key functions: Phone, emails and calendar. Today's smartphone isn't really smart, but tomorrow's smartphone will be much better and smarter with added features such as access to the Internet just like the PC and SMS connectivity. The Korean market has also requested for mobile devices to have various features such as high performance and graphics capabilities for online games. Tomorrow's smartphone will be smart enough to carry out full Internet browsing. It will have all kinds of Internet capability, media capability, and higher performance.

Basically, it is a PC. An interesting trend to see is that Nokia has renamed its smartphone Eseries as "mobile computers", which means mobile manufacturers are treating their smartphones as mobile computers. Smartphones are more like computers and the mobile Internet experience more like a computer experience.

2. Navigation device, PND is super-popular in Korea

Today's navigation device isn't connected to the Internet, but the functionality is coming, just like WiBro (WiMAX). Today's devices don't give you real-time traffic information and LBS (like where a gas station or service center is). But tomorrow's navigation is basically a computer inside and it will have the ability to give you real-time traffic information. (Korea already has a number of WiBro-embedded PNDs which can give you access to the Internet (limited) and real-time traffic information, but all services and applications are provided by content providers.)

3. Entertainment

4. Full gaming

5. Enterprise

Today's Internet pages are 99.99 percent written by computers and Intel is the company to bring those technologies to the consumer. Qualcomm and TI are very good at voice and SMS, email services, but not the Internet. It's very different. First Point, Qualcomm, TI, Nvidia used the descriptive tag "Internet Device" at last year's Computex which Intel created. This year, they're using Netbooks and MIDs. It is a sign of the validity of opportunity and vision. It does not make their product any better. They are coming from voice and analog, but Intel is coming from computing.

It's a very different ball game here. Intel is very good at computers and very good at the Internet. Arm may be good at standalone media, but it's a very different game for media on the Internet as it needs to support all kinds of codecs and Flash from existing media. Intel welcomes Qualcomm and TI, which are Arm-based Netbooks and MIDs, to the market because it gives customers more choice and speeds up industry innovation. But Intel's belief is that the best product will WIN the customer's pocket. In order to deliver the computer and Internet, you need to support the mainstream OS.

You don't have a computer, you don't get the same Internet exerience on platforms like WinCE, Windows Mobile, Symbian, embedded Linux and Palm. Moblin is PC Linux, it's not like embedded Linux. Intel has announced it will support Moblin and Android both. Intel Moorestown (Linux version) will have 50x better power consumption compared with Menlow (Atom).

Q2. Intel needs to have a close relationship with the Korean market and Korean manufacturers for building up the Intel-based MID market.

Because Korea is a market that requires MS' Windows OS as minimum criteria to surf the Internet smoothly, Intel, AMD and Via are the only options for those manufacturers. But for mobile devices, Intel is the best option at this moment. Compared to the situation in Korea, international manufacturers based mainly in Taiwan have various options for MID and Netbook solutions, such as Intel or Arm and Windows or Linux. These options are not major issues to them, so it really depends on the market.

This may be a reason it is very difficult to find a Windows XP-based MID overseas except for Compal MIDs (IFR, TIM, Aigo).

The following are answers from Kedia.

Intel had a good job with Viliv, TG and UMID for Menlow-based MIDs in Korea. LG and Intel are working on Moorestown-based devices. Korea has an ActiveX issue which need to run Windows XP to have full Internet capablity and Atom has no problems with this. Moorestown with Linux won't support ActiveX. So Intel is working with another company which has a solution around ActiveX from Linux to offer full Internet capability.

Usage in Korea is all about gaming, graphics performance for online games like MMORPG, TV and video. Navigation is moving toward 3D from 2D, and LBS is added which requires the Internet and computer performance. Intel has better performance compared with Qualcomm and TI for this. Intel's strategy is to deliver Internet computing performance in a phone factor.

This was showcased in the five MIDs announced at the Inter Mobility event with Moorestown-based MIDs. Medfield was produced based on 32nm in advanced to Arm chipset, which means Arm is two years behind Intel. (45nm over 32nm has a big impact and difference.) Intel is very well-positioned at this point. Performance and compatibility are key and Intel is right on target now. Intel is executing a seven-year plan that is just beginning.

Five Moorestown MIDs at the Intel Mobility event/Computex 2009

From Menlow to Moorestown, to the Medfield platform, Intel's main focus is to maintain high performance, compatibility, cut power and fit into smaller devices to deliver the same battery life. Intel Moorestown is based on the scenario of delivering equal battery life as Arm, or 10-20 percent less with 2x the performance and full compatibility. Moorestown supports 1080p video, encodes and decodes.

Intel's major advantage against Arm is "Compatibility". The PC is like a car. Whoever produces that car is able to fill gas from any gas station in the world. The PC is the same as well. Any PC produced by various brand will allow you to use various applications without any trouble. However, Arm is not like this. Also, Moblin, which is based on the PC Linux to optimize for mobile devices, will have compatibility for various platforms.

They are running several groups inside to work separately to support different platforms, from running on the Moblin OS such as Adobe Air which has about 1,000 Adobe apps that can be installed to Google's Android which supports 5,000 apps and more platforms to come. Intel Moorestown with a solid Moblin foundation will offer compatibility for various platforms with apps, something no one has even thought to try.

The conclusion for this interview is that Intel is still very confident of its roadmap, chipset and technology. Lately, Arm has been trying to seize a portion of the pie with its Smartbook and MID based on its solution, but Intel thinks this challenge doesn't even come close to what it can do. It's very thankful to Arm for expanding the market size, but Intel is ready to step forward. The power consumption issue is also nearly solved with the Moorestown platform offering better performance and graphics.

What do you think? Do you see what I see?

Do you believe in Intel with its new slogan "Sponsors of Tomorrow"?

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About Kevin (Kilmo) Kang

Kevin (Kilmo) Kang is a self-professed IT-savvy guy who's been having the time of his life making tech deals with new business partners in the Asia-Pacific areas. Like every Korean, he's gadget-crazy and is glad he lives in a country with one of the fastest-growing tech markets in the world. His taste for international work, however, arose from a nine-year stay in New Zealand where he fortunately made more friends than there are sheep.