SAN JOSE, Calif., Nov 29, 2004 (AP Online via COMTEX) -- A long-awaited microprocessor developed by IBM Corp., Sony Corp. and Toshiba Corp. will go into early production next year and start appearing in video game consoles, high-definition TVs and home servers in 2006, the companies said Monday.

The processor, code-named Cell, will handle vastly more memory than today's consumer chips as well as enable hardware-based copyright protection and allow multiple operating systems to run at the same time. It also will feature multiple cores, or logic engines, on a single die.

It's unclear whether Cell will pose a threat to today's most popular processors, Intel Corp.'s Pentium 4 and Advanced Micro Devices Inc.'s Athlon 64. Both companies have announced plans to include features similar to Cell's in versions planned by Cell's launch.

All computer makers see home entertainment as major driver of next-generation computers and are designing systems that can serve up all types of media - including high-definition TV, standard video and audio - at once.

The consortium behind Cell suggested today's PC chips aren't up to such computation-intensive task, both in terms of processing power and the capacity of the data pipes that connect the processor to the system memory.

"The current PC architecture is nearing its limits," said Ken Kutaragi, Sony's executive deputy president and chief operating officer.

The companies released few details about Cell, saying more information will be divulged at a technical meeting next year in San Francisco. In fact, little information has been released since the $400 million partnership was announced in March 2001 with the promise of building a "supercomputer on a chip."

IBM plans to begin pilot production of Cell during the first half of 2005 at its factory in East Fishkill, N.Y. The first product will be a Cell-based workstation it is developing with Sony. Toshiba said it expects to launch a Cell-based high-definition TV in 2006.

IBM shares rose 68 cents to $95.40 in midday trading on the New York Stock Exchange. Intel shares were down 34 cents at $22.87 on the Nasdaq Stock Market while Advanced Micro Devices was down 2 cents at $21.52 a share.

IBM, Sony and SCEI power-on Cell processor-based workstation prototype

Workstation provides quantum leap advances in creating digital entertainment content

ARMONK, NY and TOKYO, November 29, 2004

IBM, Sony Corporation (Sony) and Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. (SCEI) announced today that they have powered-on the first Cell* processor-based workstation.

The prototype workstation is the first computing application planned for the highly-anticipated Cell processor.

The companies expect that a one rack Cell processor-based workstation will reach a performance of 16 teraflops or trillions of floating point calculations per second.

While an individual Cell processor is capable of parallel processing, a cluster of Cell processors can also act as a huge parallel processing unit, being able to handle massive data required for complex physics simulation and control of digital characters in digital content creation, or can be divided into smaller groups, each carrying out different tasks.

"The Cell processor-based workstation will totally change the digital content creation environment," said Masayuki Chatani, corporate executive and CTO, Sony computer Entertainment Inc. "Its overwhelming power will be demonstrated in every aspect of the development of all kinds of digital entertainment content, from movies, broadcast programs to next generation PlayStation games."

The Cell workstation is designed to deliver tremendous computational power, helping digital entertainment content creators generate higher quality content with richer and more dynamic scenes, much faster than current development systems.

"Our collaboration with Sony is leading to a new era of innovation in the semiconductor and computing industries," said Colin Parris, vice president of product management, IBM Systems & Technology Group. "The supercomputer-like processing and performance of the Cell processor-based workstation is just the beginning of what we expect will be a wide-range of powerful next-generation solutions resulting from our joint development efforts."

Cell is a multicore chip comprising a 64-bit Power processor core and multiple synergistic processor cores capable of massive floating point processing, optimized for compute-intensive workloads and broadband rich media applications, including computer entertainment, movies and other forms of digital content.

Sony, SCEI and IBM aim to offer technology that will accelerate the paradigm shift in digital entertainment.

Contacts:

IBM
Chris Andrews
845-892-5023
candrews@us.ibm.com

Sony Corporation
Corporate Communications
Tel: 03-5448-2200 (in Japan)

Sony Computer Entertainment
Corporate Communications Department
Tel: 03-6438-8686 (in Japan)

BM, Sony, Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. and Toshiba unveil Cell processor

First details of multicore chip comprising Power Architecture and synergistic processors

ARMONK, NY and TOKYO, November 29, 2004

IBM, Sony Corporation, Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. (Sony Corporation and Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. subsequently referred to as Sony Group) and Toshiba Corporation today unveiled, for the first time, some of the key concepts of the highly-anticipated advanced microprocessor, code-named Cell, they are jointly developing for next-generation computing applications and digital consumer electronics.

The four companies also announced that they would reveal technical details of Cell at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC) to be held from February 6-10, 2005 in San Francisco.

Specifically, the companies confirmed that Cell is a multicore chip comprising a 64-bit Power processor core and multiple synergistic processor cores capable of massive floating point processing. Cell is optimized for compute-intensive workloads and broadband rich media applications, including computer entertainment, movies and other forms of digital content.

Other highlights of the Cell processor design include:

Multi-thread, multicore architecture.
Supports multiple operating systems.
Substantial bus bandwidth to/from main memory, as well as companion chips.
Flexible on-chip I/O (input/output) interface.
Real-time resource management system for real-time applications.
On-chip hardware in support of security system for intellectual property protection.
Implemented in 90 nanometer (nm) silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technology.

Additionally, Cell uses custom circuit design to increase overall performance, while supporting precise processor clock control to enable power savings.

IBM, Sony Group and Toshiba will disclose more details about Cell in four technical papers scheduled for presentation at the International Solid State Circuits Conference.

"Less than four years ago, we embarked on an ambitious collaborative effort with Sony Group and Toshiba to create a highly-integrated microprocessor designed to overcome imminent transistor scaling, power and performance limitations in conventional technologies," said Dr. John E. Kelly III, senior vice president, IBM. "Today, we're revealing just a sampling of what we believe makes the innovative Cell processor a premiere open platform for next-generation computing and entertainment products."

"Massive and rich content, like multi-channel high-definition broadcast programs, as well as mega-pixel digital still and movie images captured by high-resolution CCD/CMOS imagers, require a huge amount of media processing in real-time. In the future, this digital content will fuse and converge on the broadband network, and start to explode," said Ken Kutaragi, executive deputy president and COO, Sony Corporation, and president and Group CEO, Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. "To access and/or browse content freely in real-time, a more sophisticated graphical user interface (GUI) within the 3D world will become key in the future. The current PC architecture is nearing its limits, in both processing power and bus bandwidth, for handling such rich applications."

"The progressive breakdown of barriers between personal computers and digital consumer electronics requires dramatic enhancements in the capabilities and performance of consumer electronics. The Cell processor meets these requirements with a multi-processor architecture/design and a structure able to support high-level media processing. Development of this unsurpassed, high-performance processor is well under way, carried forward by dedicated teamwork and state-of-the-art expertise from Toshiba, Sony Group and IBM," said Mr. Masashi Muromachi, Corporate Vice President of Toshiba Corporation and President & CEO of Toshiba's Semiconductor Company. "Today's announcement shows the substantial progress that has been made in this joint program. Cell will substantially enhance the performance of broadband-empowered consumer applications, raise the user-friendliness of services realized through these applications, and facilitate the use of information-rich media and communications."

Cell provides a breakthrough solution by adopting a flexible parallel and distributed computing architecture consisting of independent floating point processors for rich media processing. Cell supports multiple operating systems, including PC/WS operating systems, as well as real-time CE/Game operating systems. In addition, the Cell processor is scalable and can be utilized in a variety of applications — from small digital CE systems within the home to entertainment applications for rendering movies, to scientific applications, such as supercomputers.

A team of engineers from IBM, Sony Group and Toshiba are collaborating on the design and implementation of Cell which is expected to deliver vast floating point capabilities, massive data bandwidth and scalable, supercomputer-like performance. The design work is taking place at a joint development lab the three companies established in Austin, Texas, after the project was announced in 2001.

IBM plans to begin pilot production of Cell microprocessors at its 300mm wafer fabrication facility in East Fishkill, NY during the first half of 2005. The first computing application IBM plans for Cell is the Cell processor-based workstation it is developing with SCEI.

Sony Corporation expects to launch home servers for broadband content as well as high-definition television (HDTV) systems powered by Cell in 2006.

Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. also expects to launch its next generation computer entertainment system powered by Cell to revolutionize the experience of computer entertainment.

Toshiba Corporation envisions diverse applications for Cell and expects to launch its first Cell-based product, a high-definition television (HDTV), in 2006.

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