NVIDIA to make its own smartphones and tablets?

posted by Alan F. / Jan 28, 2013, 12:51 AM

NVIDIA to make its own smartphones and tablets?

A NVIDIA tablet could replace this Wexler model

NVIDIA really hasn't had much luck cracking the processor market that is controlled by Qualcomm and its Snapdragon chips. According to Eldar Murtazin, the company will take matters into its own hand by producing its own smartphones and tablets, but the final product may or may not have the NVIDIA and Tegra name on it. According to the plan, NVIDIA will build reference design models and have them cheaply produced by a contact manufacturer as white label devices, and sold to regional brands that had been selling low quality Chinese tablets. Potential buyers could include Fly and Wexler in Russia, or Micromax and Lava in India.

Building the devices themselves allows NVIDIA to control the features that will be on the slate while still making a high quality device that will sell for a low price. The first devices to be rolled out are expected to be 7 inch to 10 inch tablets that will come out in the May to June time period. Some models will have a regional brand on it while others will have the NVIDIA or Tegra name on it. The naming decisions come from the local companies. We should warn you to take this story with the proverbial grain of salt. If you're out of salt, some rice will do nicely.

source: Mobile-Review (translated) via UnwiredView

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15 Comments

1. idroidequis

Posts: 103; Member since: Jan 23, 2013

Kinda like what asus did with the laptop and desktop a few years back. Looking foward to a tegra device.

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 12:55 AM 5

11. cezarepc

Posts: 718; Member since: Nov 23, 2012

Project Shield (a Tegra device) sure is sweet. I want to see what kind of smartphone/tab they can produce.

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 4:14 AM 0

15. cheetah2k

Posts: 2140; Member since: Jan 16, 2011

To be honest, its about time that Nvidia started to do this. I handled a Tegra3 reference tablet made by one of Nvidia's hardware partners, and to be honest I wanted to put it in my bag and run. The quality was top notch! Nvidia have more than enough potential to build and sell their own devices just like Samsung.

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 8:25 PM 0

2. MC1123

Posts: 1256; Member since: Nov 12, 2012

this would be nice! tegra chips are respectable and a good chip!

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 1:10 AM 7

3. imsickwithsmartphone

Posts: 153; Member since: Jan 28, 2013

Cant wait to see it happen!!!

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 1:14 AM 1

4. gravityron

Posts: 46; Member since: Aug 07, 2012

Rice? Huh? What does that mean? What does rice have to do with a grain of salt?

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 1:15 AM 1

5. VJo003

Posts: 365; Member since: Mar 11, 2012

Micomax & Lava as of today have customers in the budget phone category. For high end products people opt for HTC, decision Samsung etc. If nvidia can get this right & flood the market with high performance & decently priced devices.... There is good probability of success.

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 1:24 AM 2

10. IHateApple

Posts: 122; Member since: Sep 26, 2012

+10. If they make a smartphone variant of the Project Shield device, it would be great. 5 inch 720p screen, a low cost variant of Tegra 4, optimized stock Andoid 4.2.2 all for 200$(in India) would be great.

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 3:33 AM 1

6. XPERIA-KNIGHT unregistered

funny that nvidia is doing this because i actually said awhile back that qualcomm should make their own "snapdragon" smartphone series ...........i think it would be pretty dope if they make a powerful quadcore snapdragon phone with their own chipset inside it :)

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 1:31 AM 2

7. joey_sfb

Posts: 6794; Member since: Mar 29, 2012

No custom skin please. Just a well tune device optimize for gaming and standard google services. We will add whatever we want later.

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 1:46 AM 2

9. IHateApple

Optimized for gaming, standard google services, battery life, stability, fluid UI and high benchmark scores.

posted on Jan 28, 2013, 3:32 AM 0

13. CanYouSeeTheLight

Posts: 1122; Member since: Jul 05, 2012

Seriously why do you need high benchmark scores? I agree with everything you said but high benchmark scores? Only toddlers argue about who has the highest benchmark score.