None of those arguments have held up over the last 10 years. RISC-V has all of the things they say you need.
There's some claims in this article and in the routers article they use as source, but they're unrelated.
> ... we have entered into a new long-term agreement with Apple that extends beyond 2040, continuing our longstanding relationship of collaboration with Apple and Apple’s access to the Arm architecture.
Arm's IPO F-1/A.
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1973239/000119312523...
Which was linked in the MacRumors link.
>agreement
and
>access to the Arm architecture.
Is vague language that could mean about anything.
E.g. it could mean RAND ("reasonable" and "non-discriminatory").
Namely, the parent specifically claimed:
>Apple has a licensing deal with ARM through 2040
The vague language is insufficient to support the claim.
> we have entered into a new long-term agreement with Apple that extends beyond 2040, continuing … Apple’s access to the Arm architecture.
Clearly says that the agreement continues Apple’s access to the Arm architecture beyond 2040. That’s what a licensing deal is.
This is an important disclosure. Any attempt to pass something less than a licensing deal with this wording wouldn’t get pass the lawyers.
That's not even a contract but a public statement. A lawyer would wipe her ass with it.
We do not get to see the actual agreement, and this "access" could very well mean the RAND I mentioned, i.e. that they won't be arbitrarily denied a license.
Incidentally, the key word "license" is remarkably not included in the language used.
Do you have a source or not?
https://appleinsider.com/articles/20/06/09/how-arm-has-alrea...
https://appleinsider.com/articles/08/07/30/arm_reports_finge...
The company was founded in November 1990 as Advanced RISC Machines Ltd
and structured as a joint venture between Acorn Computers, Apple,
and VLSI Technology.
The comment implies, though, that they get a special deal because they are a founder. Neither Wikipedia nor the linked articles say that.
There won't be a source because the details of the current commercial contract between Apple and Arm will be highly confidential.
In any event, it's vanishingly unlikely that Apple gets some special unique rights to IP created in the 2000s as a result of having a big shareholding in Arm in 1991 which they sold completely in the 1990s.
Yes, Apple probably gets a great deal but because they are a huge, enormously high-profile customer who has worked closely with Arm on the development of their latest IP.
I think your analysis sounds good: Apple certainly gets special deals, but those deals don't have anything to do with having been a major share-holder of ARM some 30 years ago.
Thanks for your comment on the analysis. I see this all the time, often in even more extreme form, such as Apple gets it all for free! You can look at Arm's accounts in the 1990s and prove that Apple never got it for free.
And why would Arm give such amazing terms?
Not because Apple was an Arm founder 35 years ago.
It's probably because Apple showed Arm a prototype of a Mac or iPhone running on "Apple Silicon gen 2" aka RISC-V.