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> ARM controllers are (relatively) uniform and the svd files do a lot of the work by providing the mapping for the memory mapped peripherals.

What?

Sure, the core is relatively uniform, but the peripherals are radically different between manufacturers.

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CMSIS provides an abstraction layer for peripherals, so at least the basics are the same between manufacturers. At least it's something, usually when switch MCUs you have to rewrite everything related to peripherals.

https://developer.arm.com/embedded/cmsis

True, but the main way an ARM licensee has to differentiate their product is adding unique peripherals. So the generic functionality is in CMSIS, but the reason you chose the processor may not be.

If you look at a die photo and see what area goes to what, pretty quickly you conclude all microcontroller makers are just selling value-added flash memory.

Absolutely, device drivers must still be written. My observation is just that these device drivers are hidden deeper and deeper levels of abstraction, just like on a regular PC.

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