From
The Inquirer:
Chip designer ARM has said that vendors are looking to standardise on both one chip architecture and a single operating system such as Linux across their product lines.
With many of ARM's licensees preparing to make a big splash in the server market, the firm claimed its architecture is the only one that scales from smartphones all the way up to servers. Lakshmi Mandyam, ARM director of Server Systems and Ecosystems told The INQUIRER that the ability to stick with one chip vendor and run the same operating system throughout its product stack is something "people find very interesting".
ARM expects most of its servers to end up powering open source software stacks, which strongly suggests Linux as the underlying operating system, especially since FreeBSD's ARM port is seemingly in a state of flux. According to Mandyam, companies are increasingly interested in concentrating on a single processor and software stack, saying that vertical integration - the term given to keeping everything in-house - is once again becoming fashionable.
Mandyam said the advantages of ARM weren't limited to just being able to deploy a single vendor's chips but also include the ability to deploy Linux throughout the product range. She said firms are working with Linaro's Enterprise Working Group in order to have some influence on the direction of enterprise Linux deployment because they see it as a key component to a cost-effective server.
Mandyam said, "If you look at who is participating in Linaro's enterprise group, you have end users like Facebook that are participating as well, because they see the value of getting involved early and it really shortens the time to market. If you think about the Linux kernel, it's all standardised - based on the ARM architecture. Everyone, instead of trying to reinvent the wheel at different times, you have everyone cooperating."
Despite Linaro's Enterprise Working Group containing many firms that compete against each other for business, Mandyam claims that Linux still allows them to "maintain differentiation" that is needed to get a competitive advantage.
The combination of ARM's architecture scaling from embedded devices to servers combined with a similar capability for Linux could be the combination that allows firms to cut costs and ultimately increase profits.