ARM’s Mali™ GPU Partners report a significant increase in shipments – rising to more than 150 million processors in 2012 – and licenses grow by 30% due to superior graphics performance

CAMBRIDGE, UK, FEB 25, 2013 – ARM reveals the scale of success of its  Mali Graphics processors technology, which is powering advanced graphics and user experiences across all types of smart devices from the workplace to the home. This growth is enabled by 75 licenses of the  ARM® Mali GPU family of products across the smartphone, tablet and graphic-enabled Digital TV (DTV) markets. Mali GPUs bring a distinct balance of performance density with advanced graphics, plus first-to-market GPU compute support, to an exciting and diverse range of smart devices.

• Mali GPUs can be found in more than 70% of graphics-enabled Digital TVs
• Mali GPU features in over 50% of all Android™ tablets
• Mali GPU is used in 20% of all Android smartphones

The global smartphone market expects to see 1.1 Billion units shipping in 2013*. As this market continues to grow, so does its breadth of devices. This ranges from $50 dollar smartphones to high-end devices priced over $650 that require high-performance, power-efficient graphics technology. By using Mali GPU technology, silicon vendors and original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) can diversify and offer rich user experiences such as computational photography, facial detection and gaming with powerful near-real graphics experiences.

“We are incredibly pleased to see the success enjoyed by ARM partners that have chosen Mali GPUs,” said Pete Hutton, general manager, media processing division, ARM. “This impressive market growth has been achieved by only a quarter of the current Mali licensees. In 2013 we look forward to even more of our licensees, who have transitioned to Mali GPUs for improved performance and short development cycles, bringing new solutions to market and enjoying success.”

ARM has developed Mali GPUs to be integrated into the same system-on-chip designs as an ARM Cortex™ -A series processor. In 2012, over 95% of the Mali graphics processors shipped, did so alongside one of the ARM Cortex-A series processor from entry-level smartphones to mobile computers. ARM has built a vibrant ecosystem to enable a broad range of Operating Systems (OS) user interface and gaming partners to optimize their solutions for Mali to address the market. In 2013 the choices for consumers will expand even further. High-end Android-based devices are multiplying and more entry-level smartphones are becoming available, enabled in part by Firefox OS.

Mali GPU total volume shipments, as reported by ARM partners, have grown from less than 50 million Mali-enabled SoCs in 2011 to over 150 million units in 2012 and are expected to exceed 240 million in 2013. This growth has resulted in Mali GPUs taking market share in all the fast-growing markets: It is number 1 in the Android tablet market, and is in more than 20% of Android smartphones. This is in addition to more than 70% of all smart TVs shipped benefitting from Mali GPUs. CES saw a wide range of smart TVs on show, including Samsung’s Smart TV F8000 and LG smart TV GA7900 and GA6400, taking the TV experience to new levels with Mali GPU technology.

Samsung Electronics

"Samsung Smart TV has been leading market in transforming the viewing experiences of consumers in the living room. Through the adoption of the quad-core ARM Cortex-A15 processor and Mali-T604 GPUs, Samsung Smart TV, including the world's first quad-core built-in F8000, will enable a new way of enjoying content on TV with innovative user interfaces and faster performance," said Cheul-Hee Hahm, Master of R&D Team, Visual Display Business, Samsung Electronics, Co., Ltd.

In 2013 there will be a significant increase in the number of mass market smartphones based on Mali-400 and Mali-450 GPUs, and of high-end phones taking advantage of the high performance of the Mali-T600 family.

Leadcore

“In 2012, Leadcore Technology launched LC1810, the first TD Dualcore smartphone solution and gained broad market achievement. The LC1810 was developed leveraging ARM Cortex-A9 and ARM Mali GPU technology,” said Jitang Liu, VP of Leadcore.”This has enabled Leadcore solutions to meet the demanding performance and energy efficiency demands of the smartphone market.”

MediaTek

“MediaTek addresses a wide range of markets through scalable adaptable solutions,” said Johan Lodenius, chief marketing officer and corporate vice president, MediaTek. “ARM Mali-GPUs enable us to target markets quickly and introduce first class products with a short time to market.”

Spreadtrum

“Spreadtrum has been delighted with our wide ranging success with the Mali GPUs with more than 300 design-wins,” said Dr.YI Kang, vice president, marketing, Spreadtrum Communications. “Mali GPUs enable us to build on our offerings to OEMs through a wider range of OS support, which now includes a Firefox OS implementation. This diversity brings differentiation giving consumers more choice whilst opening up the potential enabled by HTML5.”

ST-Ericsson

“ST-Ericsson is an innovator and early adopter of new technology. We were an early licensee of the ARM Mali-400 GPU which has helped us to provide a powerful user experience on our NovaThor U8500 ModAp by bringing new levels of graphics performance to smartphone designs such as the Samsung Galaxy SIII mini, Sony Xperia P and HTC One to name a few,” said Patrice Meilland, senior vice president of NovaThor Solutions for ST-Ericsson. “By using Mali GPUs, the U8500 delivers increased performance for media-rich content and applications, such as fast web browsing, imaging, games and location based services, without compromising battery life. In 2012 we shipped tens of millions of units of our NovaThor U8500 platform, and 20 smartphones based on the U8500 platform were launched. We expect the product to continue to be a powerful offering for our customers.”

In 2012 the tablet market saw exceptional growth. A diverse and dynamic range of tablets were introduced, ranging from entry level educational focused tablets through to desktop performance devices. Tablets are driving resolution levels, with devices such as the Google Nexus 10 taking mobile devices to new resolutions. The Nexus 10 was also the first device to support Renderscript GPU Compute functionality from Google. It opened up the potential that GPU Compute, through the Mali-T604, can bring with new use cases and increased efficiency for existing tasks. The OS market choice continues to diversify with Android holding a majority market share in the mobile computing space and the inclusion of ChromeOS brings further differentiation and choice for end users.

AllWinner

“AllWinner have seen exceptional success with the Mali-400 based SoCs in the Android tablet space” said Jack Lee, chief marketing officer, AllWinner. “By using Mali-400 we have been able to bring a competitive performance density graphics solution to the market within just 9 months of licensing the Mali GPUs. We look forward to continuing this success throughout 2013.”

Rockchip

“Rockchip continues to expand the performance possibilities of a wide range of tablet solutions, and we are now moving into a new Quad-core Generation together with ARM,” said Feng Chen, CMO of Rockchip. By supporting Mali-400 we are able to provide the widest range of support for applications and games because of the dynamic ARM ecosystem support for Android tablets.”

ARM has the whole system story, from leadership CPU and GPU IP to the interconnect technology that ensures their seamless linkage. From a developer perspective, ARM also has the tools, such as the DS-5 toolchain, to enable system-wide performance analysis and optimization for software. ARM has over 20 years experience in the creation and verification of IP and is ensuring its partners have the robust and reliable Mali graphics hardware and software that is bringing new and exciting smart products to life.

*Source: Strategy Analytics, Bank of America Merrill Lynch Global Research estimates, 5th December 2012.