During the call, CEO Warren East responded to some concerns that Intel is now entering ARM's processor market within the Android ecosystem much more aggressively.
While he recognized that Intel is pouring huge resources into making its Atom chips work on Android, he told analysts that ARM's product architecture is "more appropriate" for Android systems and will continue to be "more appropriate" than Intel's products. One of the major advantages East sees for ARM are Mali (acceleration) cores, which are beginning to ship into the market now. "We are expecting tens of millions of Mali products shipping in 2011, driving the maturity of that ecosystem."
ARM reported 1.9 billion ARM processors shipped in the third quarter of 2011. 1 billion of those chips were shipped into mobile phones and mobile computers, the company said. Cortex A processor shipments were up 300 percent year-over-year. East also disclosed that dual-core Cortex-A9 chips can now be found in 14 percent of smartphones that shipped in Q2.
On concerns that Intel is moving to 22 nm processors, and that the company is heavily relying on its manufacturing process as competitive advantage, East responded that ARM processors at 28 nm will be "happening really very, very soon." However, 28 nm processor won't account for a substantial margin of the market for 18 to 24 months he noted. 20 nm products are "a couple of years out as well", East told analysts. He did not seem to be especially worried about Intel's 22 nm processors.
