Now, on to my disruptive opportunities.

The ``Cell`` microprocessor. A product of a joint venture between IBM, Sony (SNE, news, msgs) and Toshiba (TOSBF, news, msgs), this chip will power Sony`s PlayStation 3 and high-definition TVs from Sony and Toshiba. The chip combines nine cores, a big leap from the two-core chips just being introduced by Intel (INTC, news, msgs) and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD, news, msgs), to provide extremely fast rendering of computation-intensive graphics for uses that range from military displays to consumer electronics. I see this chip putting more pressure on Intel and AMD, which are both struggling to expand beyond their role as makers of chips for PCs. Who`s the winner? Too soon to tell.

http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/P143816.asp

and

http://271patent.blogspot.com/2005_02_01_271patent_archive.html

AMD`s interest in the Ignite technology is also interesting because Ignite is a Risc-like 32-bit processor core with a strong SIMD component. According to Patriot, multiple Ignites can work together within the company`s InFlame architecture to create a multi-SIMD processor. It just so happens that this configuration shares similarities with the architecture Sony and IBM have been discussing as of late to power the PlayStation 3.