ARM Releases Guide to Enable 2 GHz Cortex-A9 Manufacturing

ARM has begun offering a Processor Optimization Pack (POP) specifically for Cortex-A9-based SoCs that are manufactured in 28 nm at Globalfoundries fabs.

The POP enables chips that run at a minimum of 1 to 1.6 GHz and 2 GHz in a "typical" scenario.

"As consumer demand for high-performance, energy-efficient mobile devices increases, Globalfoundries and ARM are lowering the risk for customers by delivering optimized Cortex-A9 cores on a proven 28 nm SoC process," said Kevin Meyer, vice president at Globalfoundries, in a prepared statement. "This latest ARM physical IP solution for our 28nm-SLP process delivers industry-leading performance and energy-efficiency, while also decreasing time to market for customers’ latest mobile products."

ARM is offering the POP as an upgrade for single- and dual-core Cortex-A9 designs to achieve higher clock speeds and enable Smartphone vendors to maintain a "competitive edge". The package comes with ARM's Artisan Physical IP logic libraries and memory instances, a benchmark report that describes the exact conditions and results ARM achieved for its core implementation, as well as an implementation guide that offers detail about the methodology that was used to achieve the improved result.