Qualcomm Inc announced on Tuesday that German automaker BMW will utilize its chips in its next generation of driver-assistance and self-driving systems.
The chipmaker is the world’s biggest supplier of chips and is based in San Diego. It is looking to diversify its business and has already managed to source a third of its chip sales from sources other than smartphones (via Reuters).
A BMW spokesperson said that the new chips will be used for its “Neue Klasse” series of cars, set to start production from 2025.
As for the kind of chips BMW will be using, there will be a dedicated Qualcomm computer vision processing chip to analyze data from the front, rear, and surround-view cameras. BMW will also use a central computing chip to help the car communicate with cloud computing data centers.
However, neither of the companies has revealed how much the Qualcomm deal will be covering of BMW’s lineup.
Qualcomm has also been working with firms like Meta on virtual reality and with Microsoft on Windows laptops that use ARM-based chips, the company released through an investor presentation.
Qualcomm Chief Executive Cristiano Amon said he believes the addressable market for the firm’s technologies is now $700 billion, seven times higher than the phone chip industry alone.
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