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In the realm of smartphone processors, Arm has historically played second fiddle to Apple‘s iPhone chipsets in terms of single-core CPU power. However, recent reports suggest that Arm is gearing up for a significant showdown, with its next Cortex-X CPU, codenamed ‘Blackhawk’ and potentially named Cortex-X5, poised to be the most powerful smartphone CPU yet.
According to analyst firm Moor Insights and Strategy, the upcoming CPU from ARM will deliver the “largest year-over-year IPC performance increase in five years.” This hints at a substantial leap in performance, potentially comparable to the original Cortex-X1 CPU, unveiled in 2020. Moreover, Blackhawk is anticipated to excel in large language model (LLM) performance, suggesting a substantial boost for generative AI tasks.
Arm’s ambitious plan with Blackhawk is to bridge the performance gap between its designed processors and custom Arm implementations, directly challenging Apple’s dominance in the arena. The move aligns with Arm CEO Rene Haas’s strategy to eliminate the historical disparity in performance.
While ARM strives to outperform Apple with Blackhawk, Qualcomm is venturing into its own custom CPU design, leaving Exynos and MediaTek as potential adopters
Qualcomm has acquired Nuvia to take advantage of its ARM ISA license and build its own custom Oryon CPU cores. The company plans to use this custom core in its upcoming flagship SoC. the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4. The MediaTek Dimensity 9400 and Samsung Exynos 2500 (or Galaxy exclusive chip) will likely adopt the Blackhawk. Although there
According to the analyst, ARM is referring to the Geekbench 6 scores as a measure of the performance of its upcoming Blackhawk CPU design. However, the power efficiency will also need to be better than that in Apple’s implementation to match the expectation.
This anticipated advancement in ARM’s in-house CPU architecture sets the stage for intensified competition between Arm, Qualcomm, and Apple-based CPU designs, promising innovation and potentially lowering prices. As the industry eagerly awaits the launch of Blackhawk later this year, all eyes are on whether Arm can indeed deliver a game-changing CPU that rivals the prowess of Apple’s iPhone chips.