Who is working with the SAM9263?
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From: Ulf Samuelsson on 30 Mar 2007 02:38 >> I am lobbying for a new way of building development tools >> which should allow Atmel to bring down its cost structure. > > I did see a 32Bit/Linux EvalPCB, for just $69, recently on Atmel's web > site : > > http://www.atmel.com/dyn/corporate/view_detail.asp?ref=&FileName=AVR32NGKit_3_26.html&SEC_NAME=Product > > shows what can be done for well under $100 [Needs JTAG cable too] > It is really volume dependent and it helps negotiating with your CEM. If you use the same components, on a low volume board as on a high volume board then you still get the same price of components. I looked at the cost of producing a board, and if you have a low volume, then you run into problems with minimum order value of many components, and at AT91RM9200DK volumes that about doubled the price of the components alone. The AVR Gateway was designed to be low cost and will be produced in numbers where minimum order volume will not come into play. Atmel has been reorganised so that the AT91 team and the AVR team is now in a single organisation, and it is not unnatural to expect that they will try to become more efficient producing development boards. When you have STK500 volumes, you are a little bit more leverage, than when you only have AT91RM9200DK volumes > -jg -- Best Regards, Ulf Samuelsson This is intended to be my personal opinion which may, or may not be shared by my employer Atmel Nordic AB
From: rickman on 30 Mar 2007 09:47 On Mar 30, 2:38 am, "Ulf Samuelsson" <u...(a)a-t-m-e-l.com> wrote: > >> I am lobbying for a new way of building development tools > >> which should allow Atmel to bring down its cost structure. > > > I did see a 32Bit/Linux EvalPCB, for just $69, recently on Atmel's web > > site : > > >http://www.atmel.com/dyn/corporate/view_detail.asp?ref=&FileName=AVR3... > > > shows what can be done for well under $100 [Needs JTAG cable too] > > It is really volume dependent and it helps negotiating with your CEM. > If you use the same components, on a low volume board as on a high > volume board then you still get the same price of components. > > I looked at the cost of producing a board, and if you have a > low volume, then you run into problems with > minimum order value of many components, and at AT91RM9200DK > volumes that about doubled the price of the components alone. > > The AVR Gateway was designed to be low cost and will be produced > in numbers where minimum order volume will not come into play. > > Atmel has been reorganised so that the AT91 team and the AVR team > is now in a single organisation, and it is not unnatural to expect > that they will try to become more efficient producing development boards. > > When you have STK500 volumes, you are a little bit more leverage, > than when you only have AT91RM9200DK volumes Why would the AT91RM9200DK have been planned for low volume? Are you saying that the AT91SMA926x-EK boards are expected to be low volume? Of course this is self fullfilling prophesy when you price one board at $69 and the other at $1000! At $69 people will buy it just to play with it and see how it runs even if they don't have a need. Even better would be a design contest. Is Atmel not marketing the ARM9 parts as hard as they are the AVR32?
From: Ulf Samuelsson on 30 Mar 2007 16:27 >> > I did see a 32Bit/Linux EvalPCB, for just $69, recently on Atmel's web >> > site : >> >> >http://www.atmel.com/dyn/corporate/view_detail.asp?ref=&FileName=AVR3... >> >> > shows what can be done for well under $100 [Needs JTAG cable too] >> >> It is really volume dependent and it helps negotiating with your CEM. >> If you use the same components, on a low volume board as on a high >> volume board then you still get the same price of components. >> >> I looked at the cost of producing a board, and if you have a >> low volume, then you run into problems with >> minimum order value of many components, and at AT91RM9200DK >> volumes that about doubled the price of the components alone. >> >> The AVR Gateway was designed to be low cost and will be produced >> in numbers where minimum order volume will not come into play. >> >> Atmel has been reorganised so that the AT91 team and the AVR team >> is now in a single organisation, and it is not unnatural to expect >> that they will try to become more efficient producing development boards. >> >> When you have STK500 volumes, you are a little bit more leverage, >> than when you only have AT91RM9200DK volumes > > Why would the AT91RM9200DK have been planned for low volume? Are you > saying that the AT91SMA926x-EK boards are expected to be low volume? Of course not. I have several project in 100ku or higher volume. > Of course this is self fullfilling prophesy when you price one board > at $69 and the other at $1000! Surprisingly we sold 100s of the AT91RM9200DK at $5000 just in my region. Sales volume improved with the AT91RM9200EK but not dev tools revenue. You do have people thinking a lot before making that investment but I am only aware of one project which I lost mainly due to toolcost. The decision was delayed and delayed and then something happened which I believed would not have happened if they have had the tools in house. > At $69 people will buy it just to play > with it and see how it runs even if they don't have a need. > Even better would be a design contest. I bet that people coming to Atmel Seminars will be able to go home with an AVR32 kit. This is by far the best way to distribute the kits. > Is Atmel not marketing the ARM9 parts as hard as they are the AVR32? > The ARM9 parts at least get a lot of *my* attention. I quite often go into a customer which has *almost* decided to go with an LPC; and then show the SAM9260. If a customer is planning to use external memory, then it will be very hard for them to resist that little goodie. The pin compatible flash version, the SAM9XE, should make NXP and ST cry and trash their performance graphs. While the flash is not significantly faster, you can loop in the cache, and use the TCM for 4-5 x performance boost. NXP does not have anything which comes close to the 9260 The LPC3xxx does not have ethernet and a lot of other goodies present on the 9260 and the ST ARM9 part is a two chip solution which should not have too much higher performance than an ARM7. -- Best Regards, Ulf Samuelsson This is intended to be my personal opinion which may, or may not be shared by my employer Atmel Nordic AB
From: rickman on 30 Mar 2007 17:04 On Mar 30, 4:27 pm, "Ulf Samuelsson" <u...(a)a-t-m-e-l.com> wrote: > >> > I did see a 32Bit/Linux EvalPCB, for just $69, recently on Atmel's web > >> > site : > > >> >http://www.atmel.com/dyn/corporate/view_detail.asp?ref=&FileName=AVR3... > > >> > shows what can be done for well under $100 [Needs JTAG cable too] > > >> It is really volume dependent and it helps negotiating with your CEM. > >> If you use the same components, on a low volume board as on a high > >> volume board then you still get the same price of components. > > >> I looked at the cost of producing a board, and if you have a > >> low volume, then you run into problems with > >> minimum order value of many components, and at AT91RM9200DK > >> volumes that about doubled the price of the components alone. > > >> The AVR Gateway was designed to be low cost and will be produced > >> in numbers where minimum order volume will not come into play. > > >> Atmel has been reorganised so that the AT91 team and the AVR team > >> is now in a single organisation, and it is not unnatural to expect > >> that they will try to become more efficient producing development boards. > > >> When you have STK500 volumes, you are a little bit more leverage, > >> than when you only have AT91RM9200DK volumes > > > Why would the AT91RM9200DK have been planned for low volume? Are you > > saying that the AT91SMA926x-EK boards are expected to be low volume? > > Of course not. I have several project in 100ku or higher volume. What??? You expect to sell 100k units of the AT91SMA926x-EK boards??? How can you call that low volume??? I think you are confusing the EK with the chip. > > Of course this is self fullfilling prophesy when you price one board > > at $69 and the other at $1000! > > Surprisingly we sold 100s of the AT91RM9200DK at $5000 > just in my region. Sales volume improved with the AT91RM9200EK > but not dev tools revenue. > You do have people thinking a lot before making that investment > but I am only aware of one project which I lost mainly due to toolcost. > The decision was delayed and delayed and then something happened > which I believed would not have happened if they have had the tools > in house. That is not the only measure of the business you can loose from having high priced evaluation tools. > > At $69 people will buy it just to play > > with it and see how it runs even if they don't have a need. > > Even better would be a design contest. > > I bet that people coming to Atmel Seminars will be able > to go home with an AVR32 kit. > This is by far the best way to distribute the kits. BINGO! I can assure you that there is very little difference between the LPC2xxx and the SAM7xx parts. But much of the LPC business came from the very low cost units that are out there. I watched it grow and much of it was due to the feedback between the availability of cheap eval tools and the grassroots popularity of the chips. Each one fed the other with very rapid growth. There are still any number of vendors who only provide LPC eval boards and not Atmel. I only know of one vendor who provides Atmel support and not NXP. You may get wins at the customers who show on your radar. But there are any number of customers who select a part for a design before you know anything about them and it is not infrequent that these projects are with large customers. I know because I have seen it happen. Decisions are made without input from the vendor largely based on what the engineer is familiar with. Low cost eval tools help a great deal in getting the customer familiar with the parts with a minimum of management review. > > Is Atmel not marketing the ARM9 parts as hard as they are the AVR32? > > The ARM9 parts at least get a lot of *my* attention. > I quite often go into a customer which has *almost* decided > to go with an LPC; and then show the SAM9260. > > If a customer is planning to use external memory, then it will > be very hard for them to resist that little goodie. > The pin compatible flash version, the SAM9XE, should > make NXP and ST cry and trash their performance graphs. > While the flash is not significantly faster, you can loop > in the cache, and use the TCM for 4-5 x performance boost. > > NXP does not have anything which comes close to the 9260 > The LPC3xxx does not have ethernet and a lot of other goodies > present on the 9260 and the ST ARM9 part is a two chip solution > which should not have too much higher performance than an ARM7. So you are saying that you don't provide low cost solutions because you don't need to?
From: Ulf Samuelsson on 30 Mar 2007 18:05
>> >> > Why would the AT91RM9200DK have been planned for low volume? Are you >> > saying that the AT91SMA926x-EK boards are expected to be low volume? >> >> Of course not. I have several project in 100ku or higher volume. > > What??? You expect to sell 100k units of the AT91SMA926x-EK > boards??? How can you call that low volume??? I think you are > confusing the EK with the chip. > Reading too carelessly. The SAM9260EK is low cost from the AT91 point of view. This is based on their culture which is coming from the ASIC world. The AVR32 guys are coming from the 8 bit world and have a different culture. I expect that the reorganisation moving both groups under one hat, will result in cross-pollination. This should result in lower cost AT91 tools. > >> > Of course this is self fullfilling prophesy when you price one board >> > at $69 and the other at $1000! >> >> Surprisingly we sold 100s of the AT91RM9200DK at $5000 > That is not the only measure of the business you can loose from having > high priced evaluation tools. > I know, but if the processor is right for the job, even $5000 is not a big deal for the right project. >> >> I bet that people coming to Atmel Seminars will be able >> to go home with an AVR32 kit. >> This is by far the best way to distribute the kits. > > BINGO! I can assure you that there is very little difference between > the LPC2xxx and the SAM7xx parts. But much of the LPC business came > from the very low cost units that are out there. I think that you find that the majority of chip sales are made to very few companies, and those companies will get what they need for development. It was important for the AVR and is important for the AVR32 to promote themselves using low cost tools, because they need to have a lot of users to make it interesting for tools makers to support the parts. The AT91 team does not have to invest in promoting the ARM architecture. The approach to have cheap tools means that you can win project where basically any part will do. When you have an edge in the chip, people are prepared to pay for the tool. Where it is very important, to have low cost tools, I.E at consultants who need to be familiar with tools in anticipation of you probably have a discount program for tools. > I watched it grow and much of it was due to the feedback between the > availability of > cheap eval tools and the grassroots popularity of the chips. Each one > fed the other with very rapid growth. There are still any number of > vendors who only provide LPC eval boards and not Atmel. I only know > of one vendor who provides Atmel support and not NXP. > > You may get wins at the customers who show on your radar. But there > are any number of customers who select a part for a design before you > know anything about them and it is not infrequent that these projects > are with large customers. I know because I have seen it happen. > Decisions are made without input from the vendor largely based on what > the engineer is familiar with. Low cost eval tools help a great deal > in getting the customer familiar with the parts with a minimum of > management review. > I am well aquainted with your thinking, which I personally share. I am working hard to move Atmel to a lower cost structure for ARM tools. >> > Is Atmel not marketing the ARM9 parts as hard as they are the AVR32? >> .... > > So you are saying that you don't provide low cost solutions because > you don't need to? > I think that Atmel can live with $500 board for the ARM9 at the moment but the reason is really the underlying cost structure. If/when competition catches up, then this will become a more important decision factor. I think that prices will come down before they are needed for this reason though. -- Best Regards, Ulf Samuelsson This is intended to be my personal opinion which may, or may not be shared by my employer Atmel Nordic AB |