On cottage Phone and Android Alliance "5" MTK Subversion mobile phone industry chain

MTK One-stop solution (Turn-key) mode before the mobile phone design and development process can be divided into the following 6 steps.

The 1th step, design house from the chip manufacturers to get reference designs.

Chip manufacturers according to their own market sector of the mobile phone market forecasts, determine the next few years what mobile phone needs, and then around its own CPU core, determine the reference design of mobile phones, the purpose is to sell their chips. For example, 2003, MTK the earliest MT6205 baseband chip, the kernel is ARM7, only GSM and so on basic functions. May be because MTK thought, Gprs,wap,mp3 and so on, the market may not need, so decided to MT6205 baseband chip light and simple, these cumbersome functions are cut off.

When the hardware and software development of the reference design are nearing completion, the marketers of the chip manufacturers visit the design houses, display the new reference designs, and lobby the new scheme with broad market prospects. If design house agrees to co-operate, it designs the new phone's package based on the new reference design. Design house then sells the entire package of new phones to handset makers. Once the manufacturer decides to put into production, it will order chips in bulk to chip manufacturers, which makes the chips profitable.

2nd step, determine the accessory components.

Chip manufacturers are providing design house with reference designs, and design house provides manufacturers with product-grade designs. As mentioned earlier, the so-called product-level design, including the following parts,

1. Motherboard design, or Gerber file, or PCB board.
2. System software.
3. List of all components that need to be assembled (BOM list).
4. The supporting housing.

Chip manufacturers to provide reference design, the purpose is to sell chips, especially baseband chips. For other peripheral components, let the design house choose for itself. Design House chooses the standard of peripheral components, in addition to the quality, also need to consider the cost, as well as supplier availability on time and other factors. After the design house has identified these components, it can start designing the layout and wiring of the motherboard, determining the list of accessory components (BOM list), System software, and enclosures, and so on.

Chip manufacturers provide reference designs that often appear in the form of development boards. The so-called Development Board, also known as the big plate, because the size is much larger than the mobile phone, and some can even comparable to the size of the newspaper. Figure 29 shows Samsung's S3c44box chip Development Board [24]. The reference design for this development Board includes the use of hy57v641620 8M sdram,hy29lv160 2M Flash. If design house thinks that 8M of memory is small and 2M of Flash is smaller, it needs to be replaced with more space for RAM and Flash. [25] LCD can also be replaced by BYD's products, with better performance and cheaper prices. On this board, you can easily change the wiring, test the use of different components of the performance and energy consumption and so on.

Figure 29. Samsung S3c44box Development Board, the kernel is ARM7TDMI, some MTK baseband chip also uses the same level of arm7ej-s core [24].

Courtesy Http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2573/4194503829_e8cc18b36a_o.jpg

The 3rd step is to develop the debug driver.

At the same time to determine the component components, to develop and debug the corresponding driver.

4th step, product-level motherboard design.

After confirming the micro-processing chip and the accessory components, design house began to change the board into a small board, which is designed as a product-grade motherboard. Product-grade motherboards are designed primarily to make the motherboard more compact, which includes layout and wiring, coupled with fasteners and insulation and thermal materials, making the phone more durable.

Figure 30. iphone edition dual motherboard [26]
Courtesy Http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2752/4197014647_c1e51e976e_o.jpg

iphone first edition wireless motherboard [+]

Courtesy Http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2659/4197014655_e506f6e60f_o.jpg

Figure 30 shows the motherboard for the first edition of the iphone. The iphone has two motherboards, the left is the AP (Application Processor) motherboard, the operating system, the user interface, and the application are all running on the AP motherboard. The yellow part is an insulating film covering the chip, and the aluminum frame around it makes the phone stronger. On the right is the BP (baseband Processor) motherboard, which is responsible for communication functions. Figure 31 shows the back of the BP motherboard, as well as many of the aluminum frames used for fastening. [27] These two images [26] show the first edition of the iphone's motherboard, the 3G version of the iphone motherboard, which can be consulted.

Strictly speaking, it is inaccurate to use the iphone as an example in this introductory feature phone chapter. Because the iphone is the smart phone, not the feature phone. But whether it's the feature phone or the smart phone, the design process from the big plate to the small board is similar.

The 5th step, further debugging hardware and software to achieve the product level.

The so-called product-level highest standard, is stable, is not out of bugs. Of course in real life, it is impossible to completely eliminate bugs. However, the product has the advantages and disadvantages of the number of bugs, is a measure of product quality is an important indicator.

6th, design house designs Some reference housings, see Figure 32, and then present the entire design from inside to outside for manufacturers to see.

Figure 32. Ginwave (Jingwei) design house sample [28]

Courtesy Http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2503/4197117113_e64c36dfa8_b.jpg

In summary, the traditional handset design development is divided into 6 steps, These six steps are the responsibility of design house.

1. Get the reference design from the chip manufacturer.
2. Determine the accessory components.
3. Develop debug drivers.
4. Design the product-level motherboard.
5. Further debug the hardware and software to reach the product level.
6. Design some reference enclosures, and then present the entire design from inside to outside for manufacturers to see.

MTK One-stop solution (Turn-key) mode in the past, mobile phone design house and manufacturers of cooperation mode, mainly open BOM mode. In this collaborative model, design house provides the blueprints for the motherboard designs, as well as the list of accessory components that need to be procured (BOM list). Handset manufacturers get motherboard design drawings, let chip manufacturers according to the drawings to make the motherboard. At the same time, mobile phone manufacturers according to the BOM
 list, procurement of other required accessories components. After the motherboard and accessory components are aligned, handset manufacturers organize production and quality testing. Then the production of mobile phone machine delivery to the marketer sales.

MTK's one-stop solution (Turn-key), essentially a chip manufacturer and design house two work, by the MTK family swept. MTK provided to the handset manufacturer is not the design drawings, but to provide the main components have been assembled on the motherboard physical (PCBA), as well as a reference BOM List. Handset manufacturers simply need to purchase a motherboard-compatible LCD, microphone, speaker, and enclosure based on the BOM List. These peripherals, together with the motherboard, are then assembled and packaged to be marketed.

Using Turn-key mode, handset manufacturers need to purchase LCD and other peripherals, and then assembled to the motherboard. If the handset manufacturer, even these two steps also too troublesome, MTK can even provide complete bare metal. This mode, called the Machine Solution (Whole-set). Using Whole-set mode, mobile phone manufacturers only need to purchase and assemble the shell, it can be OEM packaging listed for sale.

Figure 33. MTK provides the motherboard, assembled the peripheral of the bare metal, as well as the housing after the mobile phone [29].
Courtesy Http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4002/4195300972_a1dd764eb8_o.jpg

Figure 34. Front of the bare Metal motherboard (PCBA) [30].
Courtesy Http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2625/4194503831_d5fbf67d28_o.png

In short, the emergence of MTK mode, subversion of the previous open BOM mode, replaced by Turn-key mode, or even whole-set mode. In Turn-key mode, MTK only provides the motherboard, see Figure 33, the left side of the photo, and the motherboard compatible with the optional BOM List. In Whole-set mode, MTK not only provides the motherboard, but also the peripherals are assembled, handset manufacturers only need to assemble the shell, see Figure 33, the middle of the picture. In the middle of the motherboard that has the peripherals assembled, see figure 34 [30]. The diagram can clearly see the MTK chip, mt6225a.

The emergence of MTK mode, breaking the previous mobile phone manufacturers, monopoly of the mobile phone market situation, the emergence of many small capital small-scale mobile phone manufacturers. For consumers, MTK Feature phone's selling point is that the price is low, the shell trendy, but the disadvantage is the same function.

MTK mode after the appearance of other design house is not nothing to do, they can still on the basis of MTK, do some value-added software development, and so on, but these tinkering work, it is difficult to reproduce the former design house day into the glory of gold.

Compared to figure 34 of the MTK Feature phone motherboard, and figure 30 in the iphone Smart phone motherboard, one obvious difference is that the former only a motherboard, the latter is divided into AP and BP two motherboard. MTK in the feature phone era of success, is it possible to continue to flourish in the smart phone era? To answer this question, start with a deeper understanding of the hardware and software differences between the feature phone and the smart phone.


Reference,

[] MTK platform development and the function of each chip. (http://bbs.cniso.org/bbs/thread-64473-1-1.html)
[24] Enhanced Samsung S3C44BOX/ARM7TDMI Development Board. (http://www.cediy.com/webHtml/Product/tooles/ARM/ARM7/16420090317111000.html)
[25] BYD LCD product introduction. (http://www.bydit.com/docc/products/lcd_p.asp)
[26] Dismantling the first edition of the iphone. (http://hkmsyp.com/forum/thread-10198-1-1.html)
[27] Dismantling the iphone version 3G. (http://www.beareyes.com.cn/2/lib/200807/14/20080714332.htm)
[28] Mobile phone design house and manufacturers of cooperation mode. (http://www.ginwave.com/docc/product/product.asp)
[] MTK platform mobile phone. (Http://wujianspace.spaces.live.com/?_c11_blogpart_blogpart=blogview&_c=blogpart&partqs=cat%3d%25e8% 25ae%25a1%25e7%25ae%2597%25e6%259c%25ba%25e4%25b8%258e%2520internet)
[30] The reason for cottage phone survival. (http://tech.sina.com.cn/mobile/n/2008-06-12/10122253121.shtml)

On cottage Phone and Android Alliance "5" MTK Subversion mobile phone industry chain