A community portal for Power technology has launched with backing from 15 companies. Power.org arrives eight months after IBM announced “Linux-like” licensing for the PowerPC ISA (instruction-set architecture). IBM hopes the portal will coalesce an OSS-like (open source software-like) ecosystem around “Power,” its broad branding term for the PowerPC ISA, related IP, foundry services, etc.

The “open-sourcing” of PowerPC

IBM announced its new “open governance model” for Power at a “Power Everywhere” event in New York City last April. The move is aimed at promoting the use of the PowerPC ISA in SoCs (system-on-chips) by letting developers customize it, and by creating an OSS-like ecosystem of IP (intellectual property) components around the ISA.

IBM's new Power licensing model enables developers to customize the architecture almost without limitatin, for use in handheld devices, networking equipment, and more. Developers can add integrated device drivers and media processing layers, adapting the architecture for use in more different kinds of devices than IBM engineers alone could target. The only stipulation is that custom PowerPC chips must still support the PowerPC instruction set, and be able to run PowerPC applications, in order to prevent the architecture from becoming fragmented.

IBM will continue to market intellectual property, chip design, and foundry services around Power. It hopes that wider penetration of the architecture into a range of embedded devices will ultimately increase its Power-related business.

Power.org

Companies involved in the formation of the Power.org community include AMCC, which recently bought IBM's 400-series embedded processor line, Bull, Cadence Design Systems, Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing, Culturecom, IBM, Jabil Circuit, Novell, Red Hat, Sony Corporation, Shanghai Belling, Synopsys, Thales, Tundra Semiconductor, and Wistron. Others companies are expected to join up in the weeks ahead, IBM says.

Power.org members will define open specifications related to Power Architecture technology. The initial goals include an open bus architcture aimed at easing the integration of technology from multiple vendors, and an open server specification aimed at catalyzing a market for large volume, low-cost servers to “complement” IBM's own line of Power Linux servers.

IBM hopes these and other open Power standards will spark innovation in market segments such as consumer electronics, networking, automotive, and IT systems, where semiconductors increasingly integrate technologies from multiple vendors, it says.

Open standards are particularly important in emerging economies like China. “Chinese firms can embrace and contribute to open technologies, while maintaining their own freedom of action and unique differentiation,” said Infotech Ventures's chief investor, Roger Li, who was designated by the Chinese Ministry of Information Industry to manage the State Electronic & Information Industry Development Fund.

IBM's VP of systems and technology development iRod Adkins said, “Open standards increase customer choice and tear down barriers to integration. We anticipate acceleration of the rate of change in the hardware world that standards like Java technology and Linux have enabled in the software world.”

Another recent IBM announcement has revealed details of the PowerPC based “Cell” processors under joint development by Sony, IBM, and Toshiba. The multicore chips are expected to appear in Sony's forthcoming Playstation 3 next year.

Power technology also powers Bluegene-L, a US DOD (Department of Defense supercomputer that, though only a quarter completed, is already doubling supercomputer performance records.

 
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