Will Google Be Making Its Own Pixel Mobile Processors?

We’ve heard quite a lot in respect to the upcoming Pixel 2 in the last few weeks, but today’s news has to do more with the Pixel’s distant future.

A report coming out of Variety claims that Google is gearing up to start producing its own SoCs. With this goal in mind, the Mountain View-based company hired ex-Apple chip architect Manu Gulati to lead its mobile SoC CPU architecture efforts.

Google is also looking to hire a “Hardware Engineer, Mobile SoC Architect”, “Mobile SoC CPU Architect” and “Mobile SoC Memory Architect”. What all these job listings seem to indicate is that Google is seriously considering the possibility of taking up in-house chip production.

But will this be a practical decision on behalf of Google? It makes sense for the world’s largest smartphone brands – Apple, Samsung and Huawei – to produce their own silicone pieces, but can we say the same for Google? A recent report indicated Google sold only 1 million Pixel devices since the phones launched last year.

Is Google prepared to deal with the cost losses, only to gain better control over its hardware? Quite possibly. But don’t expect Google’s custom chips to pop-up any time soon. This fall, when the next-gen Pixel 2 devices arrive they are probably going to be bundled with a Snapdragon 835 processor (or maybe Snapdragon 836) as expected.

[Variety]