Qualcomm announces flagship €125m investment in AI transformation for Cork

Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. a wholly owned subsidiary of Qualcomm Incorporated, has announced a €125m investment that will see the transformation of the Cork site into a strategic AI pillar in the global chipmaker’s organisation over the next three years.

Founded in 1985 and headquartered in San Diego, CA, Qualcomm is a global leader in wireless technology and advanced semiconductors. The company develops cellular standards such as 4G, 5G, and now 6G. It is also one of the world’s largest fabless semiconductor companies, which sees it provide critical advanced semiconductor technology across mobile, wearables, PC, XR, IoT, automotive and data centres.

Qualcomm Technologies has had a presence in Cork since 2013, and this year it celebrates 10 years since it hired its first engineer in the city. In that time, Qualcomm has embedded itself in the community and has built strong relationships with UCC, MTU, and Tyndall, helping support the next generation of Irish engineers through internships and graduate role opportunities.

This flagship project, which is supported by the Irish Government through IDA Ireland, plans to undertake a new RD&I project in Cork, leveraging current capabilities to align with Qualcomm’s diversification strategy beyond mobile technology into areas such as PC, XR/VR, IoT, automotive, and data centres.

 

Minister for Enterprise Tourism & Employment Peter Burke TD said:
“Today’s announcement by Qualcomm is a powerful endorsement of Ireland’s ambition to lead globally in advanced research, next‑generation computing and AI. This €125 million investment further strengthens Ireland’s position as a hub of deep‑tech innovation, creating hundreds of high value jobs. This announcement is also a signal of support for Silicon Island: Ireland’s National Semiconductor Strategy, which aims to make Ireland a world leader in semiconductors through securing long‑term investments, developing a robust talent pipeline and seizing opportunities in technologies of the future such as AI.

Qualcomm’s continued expansion builds on Ireland’s strong semiconductor ecosystem and demonstrates the value of the collaborative environment we have fostered between industry, academia and Government.  The Government is proud to support this strategically significant project through IDA Ireland, and I wish the team at Qualcomm the very best for the future.”

EVP, Chief Strategy and Corporate Development Officer of Qualcomm Incorporated, Colin Ryan said: “Qualcomm’s success and ongoing growth in Ireland reflect the strength of our partnerships with the Government, IDA Ireland and Irish universities. This investment underscores Cork’s importance as a strategic Global R&D hub for Qualcomm and our commitment to supporting Ireland’s innovation ecosystem.”

Vice President of Engineering at QT Technologies Ireland Limited, Paul Kelleher said: “Qualcomm is proud of what we’ve achieved in Ireland—and we are even more excited about what’s ahead. We’re not just building technology; we’re shaping the future, right here in Cork.”

IDA Ireland CEO Michael Lohan said: “I wish to congratulate the entire team in Qualcomm on the announcement of this landmark investment – a substantial and complex project in both its scale and scope, reflecting its strategic and transformative nature.   This €125m R&D investment and the future jobs it will create, positions Qualcomm Ireland at the forefront of technological and product development in the AI-era. Today’s event also recognises a decade since Qualcomm hired its first engineer in Ireland, I wish you continued success and assure the team of IDA Ireland’s continued partnership and support.”

Qualcomm is currently hiring engineers across several business areas. To explore opportunities to join the team in Cork, visit Careers

Lero researchers explore research opportunities with Qualcomm to develop AI technologies for enhanced efficiency

Lero, the Science Foundation Ireland Research Centre for Software, today announced a research initiative with Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. This initiative aims to explore ideas relative to both the University of Limerick and Qualcomm Technologies, focusing on enhancing performance by using highly advanced technology for artificial intelligence (AI). The initiative, led by Lero researcher Professor Patrick Denny of the University of Limerick (UL), leverages technology from Qualcomm Technologies with the aim of improving the decision-making capabilities of AI in various applications.

Professor Denny, who holds 151 patents, said, “Through this work with Qualcomm Technologies, we aim to explore (or study) the ability of AI to interpret complex data more effectively, to improve operations across multiple environments and potentially increase efficiency. “We want to better understand how vision systems can be combined with AI, particularly in challenging visual conditions.”

“The results of this research can support the development of more reliable vision systems for a range of applications, such as potential automotive, drone, and robotic technologies,” said Prof. Denny, who lectures in the Dept. of Computer Science and Information Systems (CSIS) at UL.

Paul Kelleher, VP of Engineering, QT Technologies Ireland Limited, added, “Lero’s excellent international research reputation and Qualcomm Technologies’ commitment to research and development of next-generation technologies will drive and support cutting-edge research. Through enhanced AI capabilities, we are aiming to significantly improve how systems perceive and react to their environment.”

Qualcomm announces $127M investment in cutting-edge R&D at Cork campus

Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. a wholly owned subsidiary of Qualcomm Incorporated, has announced a $127M expansion of its Research and Development facility in Cork City. The investment is expected to create more than 150 highly skilled engineering roles over the next four years.

This project, which is supported by the Irish Government through IDA Ireland, seeks to create and develop core new knowledge for a broad range of industries, significantly advance skills capability in its subsidiary, QT Technologies Ireland, and advance the skillset of QT Technologies Ireland’s R&D team.  This expansion of facilities will see hardware and software research teams co-locate in the Cork facility.

Minister for Enterprise Trade & Employment Simon Coveney TD said: “QT Technologies Ireland’s expansion at Penrose Dock is fantastic news for Cork. Up to 150 specialized jobs will be created over the next four years, and I understand recruitment is already underway for many of these engineering posts. These roles which will provide excellent opportunities for our talent pool to join a world-renowned tech company such as QT Technologies Ireland. At the heart of this project is digital transformation, bringing QT Technologies Ireland’s R&D, hardware and software teams together in Cork, and allowing for innovative and exciting new work to be undertaken. This announcement further highlights Ireland’s position as a global hub for the world’s leading tech companies, and I would like to thank Qualcomm Technologies for its continued investment in Ireland. I wish all the team every success with this new expansion.”

Qualcomm Technologies provides critical advanced semiconductor technology to mobile communications and other industry sectors. Headquartered in San Diego California, Qualcomm Technologies has had a presence in Cork since 2013, where QT Technologies Ireland already employs hundreds of people.

“We are excited about this investment in QT Technologies Ireland where we continue ground-breaking engineering work.” Said Ajay Bawale, SVP, Engineering, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. “This project will introduce new highly specialized skills into Ireland and QT Technologies Ireland is currently recruiting engineers across several areas.”

“We are very proud that this project means the highly skilled teams in Cork will be addressing market challenges by enabling industries such as manufacturing, automotive, hyperscale computing, gaming, medical and education.” Said Paul Kelleher, VP Engineering, QT Technologies Ireland Limited. “Enabling Digital Transformation at every level. QT Technologies Ireland is a very exciting place to work, given our uniqueness in Ireland in developing the broad set of skills and capabilities required to execute on advanced process technology nodes.”

“Since 2013, the QT Technologies Ireland facility in Cork City has grown from strength to strength. This globally recognised company, in its sector, is now creating and developing critical leading-edge tech, in a regional location.” said CEO of IDA Ireland, Michael Lohan. “This latest investment increases the strategic functions managed by the leadership team at the Cork facility, significantly enhancing the South West of Ireland’s established tech cluster. I wish QT Technologies Ireland continued success and assure them of IDA Ireland’s continued partnership.”

To explore opportunities to join the team in Cork, visit  Careers (myworkdayjobs.com)

IDA Ireland welcomes Qualcomm’s multimillion-euro expansion of Cork facility. #IDA #Qualcomm

IDA Ireland welcome today’s announcement that Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. a wholly-owned subsidiary of Qualcomm Incorporated, will establish a Research and Development facility in Cork City. The multimillion-euro four-year investment is expected to create hundreds of highly skilled engineering roles. The project, which is supported by the Irish Government through IDA Ireland significantly enhances the reputation of the Irish semiconductor industry, adding to Ireland’s strong reputation in microelectronics R&D.

Ajay Bawale, VP, Engineering, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. said: We are excited about the new workplace in Penrose Dock. Not only are the offices state of the art, but they also have specially purposed and designed labs to enable continued ground-breaking security and validation work.”

Paul Kelleher, Sr. Director, Engineering for QT Technologies Ireland Limited and the site lead for the new facilities in Cork added: “This city centre location will help us to attract the world-class engineering talent needed to fuel our continued success.”

Qualcomm Technologies’ local affiliate moved into the new 4,600 m2 facility at Penrose Dock in Cork City Centre in October and is recruiting for roles in the ASIC areas of Digital, Analog, Machine Learning, Automotive, CAD, Automation, System Validation, Advanced Design for new Technologies and Software Engineering using leading-edge technologies to work on the next generation of ASIC Chips. For more information visit Qualcomm.Com/Careers

Commenting on the announcement, Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise Trade and Employment Leo Varadkar said: This is really welcome news for Cork. Ireland is known for being one of the leading Research, Development and Innovation locations in the world and today’s announcement is further evidence of our strength in this area. This announcement from Qualcomm to invest €78m to establish a new Research and Development centre in Cork, is expected to create hundreds of highly-skilled roles over the next four years. Our skilled and talented workforce allows companies like Qualcomm to embed and grow their operations here. I wish them every success with their expansion plans.

CEO of IDA Ireland, Martin Shanahan said: “Qualcomm’s new Research & Development Centre in Cork will operate on the cutting edge of technological innovation in Ireland. It is a terrific project for Cork and the South West region, and demonstrates IDA Ireland’s proven record of winning investments for regional locations. This investment also significantly enhances the reputation of the Irish semiconductor industry, adding to Ireland’s strong standing in microelectronics R&D.  I wish Qualcomm every success with today’s announcement and assure them of our continued support.”

The next gen for charging technology Quick Charge 3.0 from #Qualcomm announced by @Tiwaash

In this era of quick charging technology, Qualcomm has announced the Quick Charge 3.0, the next-generation fast charging technology. It is said to be 4X faster than the conventional charging, twice as fast as Quick Charge 1.0 and 38% more efficient than Quick Charge 2.0.

Quick Charge 3.0 can be implemented with USB Type-A, USB micro, USB Type-C or proprietary connectors. Next-generation chargers, including wall chargers, car chargers, battery packs, and power controllers will support Quick Charge 3.0. It will help improve fast charging up to 27% or reduces power dissipation by up to 45% when compared to Quick Charge 2.0. It is also 100% backward-compatible with Quick Charge 1.0 and Quick Charge 2.0 devices and supports a broad range of connectors.

Quick Charge 3.0 will be available in Snapdragon 820, 620, 618, 617, and 430 processors. Some of these processors will ship later this year and some next year. Accessories with Quick Charge 3.0 are expected in 2016.

Stay tuned for more tech news.

Qualcomm makes Snapdragon 616, 412 and 212 official at SIGGRAPH 2015 by @Tiwaash

Qualcomm announced the Snapdragon 616 processor with 4G LTE support in their Snapdragon 600 lineup successor of the Snapdragon 615 SoC that was introduced last year. This has the same Quad-core ARM Cortex A53 + Quad-core ARM Cortex A53 arrangement, but the second set of Cortex A53 cores are clocked at 1.2GHz per core, compared to 1GHz in the Snapdragon 615 processor.

It has integrated X5 LTE Global Mode modem and the same Adreno 405 GPU present in the Snapdragon 615 chip. Qualcomm also introduced Snapdragon 212 and 412 processors with LTE recently. The Qualcomm Snapdragon 616 is already present in Huawei Maimang 4 smartphone that was released in China recently.

The chip maker also made Snapdragon 412 and 212 official. The 412, meanwhile, bumps up the Cortex-A53 from 1.2GHz to 1.4GHz and its memory interface now has a max of 600MHz compared to the 533MHz in the 410. The 212 takes off from the 616 with its single cluster of Cortex-A7 being upped to 1.3GHz from 1.1GHz in the 210.

Highlights of Qualcomm Snapdragon 616 SoC

  • Quad-core 1.7GHz ARM Cortex A53 + quad-core 1.2GHz ARM Cortex A53 64-bit capable
  • Built on 28nm LP process
  • Adreno 405 GPU with DirectX 11.2 and Open GL ES3.0
  • Integrated X5 LTE Global Mode modem, supporting LTE FDD, LTE TDD, WCDMA (DC-HSDPA, DC-HSUPA), CDMA1x, EV-DO, TD-SCDMA and GSM/EDGE
  • LTE Broadcast and LTE multimode dual SIM
  • 3rd gen power efficient LTE multimode transceiver with Qualcomm RF360 Front End
  • LPDDR3 800MHz Single-channel 32-bit (6.4GBps)/eMMC 4.51 SD 3.0 (UHS-I)
  • Supports up to Quad High Definition (2560×1600) displays
  • Up to 21 MP camera
  • 1080p playback at 60 fps with H.264 (AVC) and H.265 (HEVC) formats, 1080p capture at 30 fps with H.264 (AVC)
  • Miracast support for wireless streaming of multimedia content
  • Integrated Qualcomm VIVE 802.11ac Wi-Fi with MU-MIMO and Bluetooth 4.0 solutions.
  • Qualcomm IZat Gen8C
  • Qualcomm Quick Charge 2.0 technology

While leaving the masses disappointed as the highly anticipated Snapdragon 820 did not make it to the list.

Stay tuned for more tech buzz.