Why Software-in-Silicon is needed for Performance-constrained Workloads

The x86 microprocessor has reached a limit in how much an application can be speeded up. Intel can no longer rely on economies of scale to drive market share in processors. Future advances will come from designing the microprocessor and software-in-silicon together. There are multiple large niches that have opened up to new processor/software approaches, including mobile, IoT servers, specialized servers for the cloud, telecommunications servers and large system servers for large database and big data applications. New winners in this space are likely to come from companies like Apple, Amazon, Fujitsu, Google, Hitachi, IBM, Microsoft and Oracle.