P.A. Semi

P.A. Semi Inc.
Company typeSubsidiary
IndustryFabless semiconductor company
Founded2003
FounderDaniel W. Dobberpuhl
FateAcquired by Apple in 2008.
Headquarters,
ProductsPWRficient processor
Number of employees
150 person engineering team
ParentApple Inc.

P. A. Semi (originally Palo Alto Semiconductor[1]) was an American fabless semiconductor company founded in Santa Clara, California in 2003 by Daniel W. Dobberpuhl,[2][3] who was previously the lead designer for the DEC Alpha 21064 and StrongARM processors. The company employed a 150-person engineering team which included people who had previously worked on processors like Itanium, Opteron and UltraSPARC.[4] Apple Inc acquired P.A. Semi for $278 million in April 2008.[5]

P.A. Semi developed the PWRficient PA6T-1682M CPU, which was used in the AmigaOne X1000.

  1. ^ Kanellos, Michael (2005-10-24). "Start-up plans new energy-efficient processor". ZDNet. Retrieved 2020-06-25.
  2. ^ Maiellaro, Bridget (2008-08-24). "Apple purchases alum's microchip company". ECE Illinois. University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Archived from the original on 2016-01-18. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  3. ^ MacCrae, Afred U. (April 2003). "EDS Members Named Winners of the 2003 IEEE Technical Field Awards". IEEE. Archived from the original on 2003-07-26.
  4. ^ Krazit, Tom (2005-10-24). "New company to use IBM's Power for low-power chips". Computerworld. Retrieved 2022-07-26.
  5. ^ "Apple Buys Chip Designer". Forbes. Retrieved 2008-04-23.