On Thu, Mar 4, 2010 at 3:24 PM, William "Chops" Westfield
<westfw@mac.com> wrote:

> An interesting question from a business perspective is whether PICs
> are more expensive because they cost Microchip more to produce, or
> just because microchip CAN charge more.

It is mostly because that they cost Microchip to produce due to
the older process nodes they are in (older PIC16F and PIC18F).
Microchip can not charge more than ST and TI anyway. It
can probably be able to charge more than Atmel and has to
charge more than Atmel.

> It can be hard to track PIC
> prices per functionality; older chips don't disappear the way they do
> from other vendors; they just stop getting cheaper while newer chips
> with better functionality are introduced at a lower price. =A0(most
> recently the "enhanced midrange" chips, I think. =A0PIC16F1xxx)

Enhanced PIC16F1xxx only appeals to existing PIC16F customers.
Similarly, PIC32 seems to only appeals existing PIC customers
as far as I know.

Existing PIC customers will be still be using PICs. But I do not
see many other customers who use ARMs to switch to PIC24/PIC32.
At least that is what I get from talking to some other guys,
including Microchip guys.

> And who knows how much PICs really sell for in large volumes (when things
> become "negotiable.") =A0It can be a good position to be in, to not have
> to advertise very low prices just to attract customers.
> (Atmel, Freescale, and NXP both frequently appear on lists of
> companies in questionable financial shape. =A0No so Microchip.)
>

But now we are talking about other big guys like TI and ST who
are in the picture as well. They are much more stronger in terms
of finance position than Atmel/Freescale/NXP/Renesas-NEC.

I am not saying that Microchip MCUs will soon lost its position
as No 1 in 8-bit or doing quite badly soon. It is still a good
company to work with due to its good support. But I believe
that Microchip will have to enhanced the PIC24/PIC32/PIC18
line and lower the cost in order to compete in the near
future. I do not see the advantages to use any PIC18/PIC24/PIC32
right now compared to 32bit ARM Cortex M3 MCUs.

Buying SST may be a good first step. I am not sure if they
want to bite the bullet and license ARM Cortex cores
(or buy another MCU companies with ARM cores).
It may happen, who knows.


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Xiaofan http://mcuee.blogspot.com

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