Apple caught the Intel 5G modem several weeks before the Qualcomm settlement

APPLE APPLE The lead developer of the Intel 5G modem, now deceased, comes just a week before burying his hatchet with rival chip maker Qualcomm.

So says a report in The telegraph, who claims that Apple caught Umashankar Thyagarajan in February, just weeks before settling his long legal battle with Qualcomm. Thyagarajan is now an "architecture at Apple", according to his Linkedin profile.

According to an email sent to Intel staff, written by executives Messay Amerga and Abhay Joshi, Mr. Thyagarajan had "played a key role" in the LTE chip featured in the iPhone of the year last and had been the project engineer responsible for the development of the XMM 8160 5G of the company. modem.

The departure of Thyagarajan would have been a major setback for the project and would have forced a change of course for Intel's 5G smartphone modems development program.

It probably also contributed to the chip maker's decision to leave 5G modems for smartphones, which it announced immediately after Apple and Qualcomm hugged and cleared, noting that the surprise settlement, which included a provision of multi-year chipset "- did not leave it" a pathway profitability and positive returns ".

According to a separate report to the the the Wall Street newspaperApple was also in talks to buy Intel's 5G division for "several billion dollars for its 5G division," but the talks apparently failed at the time of its settlement with Qualcomm.

The report notes that Intel could still try to hurt the company, which loses it about $ 1 billion a year. The sale should include personnel, patents and modem designs over several generations of technologies.

Apple is still a "possible buyer", according to the WSJ, adding more fuel to the rumors that the company plans eventually to build its own 5G modems; a recent scoop of Quick business says the company has accelerated its internal efforts and that 1,000 to 2,000 engineers are working on chips. μ