Almost four years ago to the day, Nvidia bought Icera, a company known for its baseband processors that came with RF components. The plan was to integrate Icera's products into the Tegra processor, giving it the one-two punch of an application and baseband processor.
But now, it seems that Nvidia's ownership is coming to an end, with the company winding down operations with Icera in the second quarter of 2016. Nvidia is open to a sale of the company and its technologies.
The change means that Nvidia no longer needs Icera to provide the baseband processor. Until the second quarter of 2016, Icera will continue to provide the 4G LTE modem for the company. After that, Nvidia will rely on third-party suppliers to provide necessary modems instead of using its in-house company.
The reason for the reduction of operations, at least according to Nvidia, is due to a refocus in company priorities, specifically in cloud computing, automotive and gaming. With this change, Nvidia needs to drop some weight in costs to allocate its resources to these three areas. Having a third-party supplier would be a cheaper solution, especially if the modems are not a big focus for Nvidia.
At the moment, Icera has 500 employees in the UK, France, Asia and the U.S. More details about the potential sale, as well as how it affects the company's finances, will be revealed when Nvidia announces its first quarter financial results for 2015 on May 7.
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