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Transmeta: the chip on Intel's shoulder

Jesse Berst AnchorDesk

Published: 08 Nov 2000 18:25 GMT

As I was checking out the bacon-wrapped scallops, I heard Intel CEO Craig Barrett dismissing chip upstart and rival Transmeta.

That's when I first realized that Transmeta might be in real trouble. Intel is a famously paranoid company. If they're not taking Transmeta seriously, then the young chip maker could indeed be hurting.

Then more bad news surfaced this week about Transmeta on the eve of its initial public offering. Let's take a closer look at Transmeta and the news around it, then I'll tell you why we'll all benefit from a lively Transmeta.

THE PROMISE OF TRANSMETA
Founded in 1995, Transmeta laboured in secrecy until early this year when it burst onto the market claiming it was five years ahead of chip makers Intel and AMD (Advanced Micro Devices).

This Silicon Valley upstart is staking its future on semiconductors -- for notebooks and other small devices -- that run cool and conserve power without hurting performance. Transmeta does this with what they call "code-morphingall " technology. It uses software to perform functions that hardware has. While it's running, the Crusoe chip recompiles x86 code into native Crusoe code, which bogs down performance some. But only for a little while, because it only has to do it once. The resulting power savings is hyped to push notebook battery life up to 12 hours running between 100 MHz and 600 Mhz.

That's the promise of Transmeta, but the reality isn't playing out so smoothly. BAD NEWS, GOOD NEWS
Three things important to Transmeta's future happened in the past week: IBM canceled plans for a ThinkPad mini-notebook using Transmeta's Crusoe processor. Big Blue said it is still evaluating Transmeta's low-power chip technology for future products. Compaq said it will skip over the Crusoe chip in favor of Intel's low-power chip.

Transmeta took its initial public offering to the market, where the reception was not just good, but great in spite of the bad news from IBM and Compaq.

The bad tidings from IBM and Compaq don't put Transmeta in dire straits.

At the end of September, Transmeta had already shipped to four hardware makers.

Sony will use the Crusoe chip in its VAIO PictureBook.
Fujitsu will use Crusoe in two of its notebook computers.
Hitachi will use Crusoe in three notebook computers and an Internet appliance.
Gateway will use Crusoe for Internet appliances still under development with AOL.

But there's more to the story than headlines....