Apple now controls all core chips in iPhone Air; new architecture prioritizes AI

iPhone Air is the thinnest iPhone ever, delivering pro performance, amazing new camera systems on the front and back, and fantastic all-day battery life.
Apple’s A19 Pro chip features a significant architectural overhaul, integrating neural accelerators into each GPU core to boost computational performance.

Additionally, Apple unveiled its first-ever iPhone wireless chip, the N1, alongside the second-generation C1X modem. Analysts note this strategic shift grants Apple full control over its iPhone’s core chip ecosystem.
Katie Tarasov for CNBC:
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“That’s where the magic is. When we have control, we are able to do things beyond what we can do by buying a merchant silicon part,” said Tim Millet, Apple vice president of platform architecture. He sat down with CNBC at Apple Park in September for the first U.S. interview about the new chips.
Until now, Broadcom was the main provider of wireless and bluetooth chips for iPhones, although Apple has made networking chips for the AirPods and Apple Watch for nearly a decade. Apple’s N1 is in the entire iPhone 17 lineup and the iPhone Air.
Qualcomm modems remain in the iPhone 17, 17 Pro, and 17 Pro Max, but Apple’s C1X is in the iPhone Air… Apple’s Mathias said the C1X is “up to twice as fast” as the C1 and “uses 30% less energy” than the Qualcomm modem in the iPhone 16 Pro.
“We are building the best on-device AI capability that anyone else has,” Millet told CNBC. “Right now we are focused on making sure that these phones that we’re shipping today, or shipping soon, will be capable of all the important on-device AI workloads that are coming.”
[Ben Bajarin, CEO of Creative Strategies], told CNBC that Apple’s neural accelerators may work similarly to the tensor cores on Nvidia’s AI chips, such as the H100.
“We expect that there would be modems coming to Mac. We would expect there’s modems coming to iPad. There’s probably N variants of the networking chip coming to Mac,” Bajarin said. “I think over the course of the next few years, it will be on all of the portfolio.”
When CNBC asked Apple’s Millet if neural accelerators will be in the GPU cores of M5, the next anticipated SoC for Mac, he said, “We have a unified approach to architecture.”

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MacDailyNews Take: As we’ve been saying for two decades (yikes): no one can match Apple’s vertical integration.
Apple’s control of the whole widget (hardware+operating system] guarantees as seamless an experience as possible… Control of the whole widget always was, and still is, one of Apple’s main advantages. – MacDailyNews, April 30, 2006
The more vertical integration, the better! So-called competitors will only fall further and further behind. – MacDailyNews, December 19, 2015
Apple’s A19 Pro is manufactured using TSMC’s advanced 3nm process in Taiwan. TSMC aims to start 3nm production in Arizona by 2028. Apple told CNBC it is dedicated to producing chips at TSMC’s Arizona facility. “We’re thrilled about TSMC’s expansion into U.S. manufacturing. It will benefit us with closer time zones, and we value the increased supply chain diversity,” Millet told CNBC.
I’ve always wanted to own and control the primary technology in everything we do. – Steve Jobs

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