Why Must IBM Keep the Cost of Advanced Chip R&D?

IBM has agreed to pay Globalfoundries $1.5 billion to take its chip business off its hands but is retaining the responsibility and cost of advanced semiconductor research. In a conference call to discuss the proposed sale John Kelly senior vice president of research at IBM and Sanjay Jha, CEO at Globalfoundries, presented the arrangement as the most natural thing in the world.

Kelly even spoke of semiconductor R&D making its way from IBM sites around the world to Albany, New York, where it would implemented by Globalfoundries and then be passed back to IBM in the form of chips to be used in its systems. It's a complicated route, albeit one that ties IBM and Globalfoundries together for the next ten years. That is the time that Globalfoundries is expected to execute the manufacturing plan that had been mapped out by IBM.

But this arrangement is unusual and needs some explanation or is the current plan merely a stop-gap that will gradually see Globalfoundries taking on more responsibility for sub-10nm research?

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