Freescale Surpasses 16-Million Units Shipped of DSPs Based on StarCore™ Technology
AUSTIN, Texas--Less than seven years after introducing its first product based on the StarCore architecture, Freescale Semiconductor has shipped more than 16 million digital signal processors (DSPs) based on the technology.
Sales of Freescale DSPs based on StarCore technology have accelerated dramatically in recent years, easily surpassing the worldwide DSP growth rate since 2000. After shipping its first million units in four years, Freescale sold approximately 15 million units over the next three years.
Freescale’s standing as the world’s No. 2 supplier of programmable DSPs is due in large part to the market acceptance and strength of its products based on StarCore technology. Rapid adoption of Freescale products based on StarCore technology has helped the company establish and maintain leadership positions in semiconductors for wireless, networking and other growing markets.
With more than 130 design wins to date, StarCore-based DSPs from Freescale power cellular handsets and a broad range of wired and wireless infrastructure equipment.
According to Will Strauss, president and principal analyst for Forward Concepts, establishing marketplace momentum for a new DSP architecture in a highly competitive field is a notable achievement. "Freescale has clearly demonstrated strong commitment to the StarCore DSP architecture, investing in continuing R&D and building a significant multi-company support ecosystem," said Strauss. "Freescale's efforts have paid off, with annual unit shipments now in the millions, and the company appears committed to the architecture for the long haul."
StarCore technology is the foundation for a number of Freescale’s most compelling products, including the award winning MXC cellular platform product line and Freescale’s MSC8144 – the industry’s highest-performance fully programmable DSP.
“Demand for our DSPs based on StarCore technology is tremendous, and the pipeline continues to grow,” said Jeff Timbs, marketing director for Freescale’s Digital Systems Division. “The 16-million unit milestone does not include sales of the MSC8144, which is just now ramping. Consequently, we anticipate continuing momentum for our portfolio of offerings based on StarCore technology.”
Announced earlier this year, independent benchmark scores show the MSC8144 DSP soaring against competition. The MSC8144 device was the top performer among fully programmable DSPs tested by Berkeley Design Technology, Inc. (BDTI). Freescale's MSC8144 achieved a BDTIsimMark2000(TM) speed score ranging from 9520 - 11900, using only one of its four SC3400 cores. This result confirms that the MSC8144 DSP operating at 1 GHz offers greater signal-processing speed than Texas Instruments' TMS320C64x+-based device. Benchmark scores are available at: http://www.bdti.com/bdtimark/chip_fixed_scores.pdf
About StarCore DSPs from Freescale
StarCore™ DSP technology from Freescale is the driving force behind some of the most sophisticated, flexible and powerful digital signal processing devices in the industry. It enables the creation of highly advanced DSP products uniquely suited to address current and emerging market requirements. StarCore technology runs more applications with less – less power, fewer components and lower cost. Freescale Semiconductor owns the StarCore trademark and is actively charting the course for future generations of StarCore architectures.
About Freescale Semiconductor
Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. is a global leader in the design and manufacture of embedded semiconductors for the automotive, consumer, industrial, networking and wireless markets. The privately held company is based in Austin, Texas, and has design, research and development, manufacturing or sales operations in more than 30 countries. Freescale is one of the world's largest semiconductor companies with sales of $6.2 billion (USD) for the previous four quarters. www.freescale.com
Freescale(TM) and the Freescale logo are trademarks of Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. All other product or service names are the property of their respective owners. © Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. 2006.