IBM has agreed to license the Cell processor -- set to drive Sony PlayStations and Toshiba TVs -- to medical and military equipment maker Mercury Computer Systems Inc., in the first deal for the chip beyond consumer electronics.
Mercury, said the company plans to use Cell as the core technology to power a range of "embedded" computers it designs for magnetic resonance image scanners in medicine to missile radar and sonar systems for military uses.
IBM and Chelmsford, Massachusetts-based Mercury said they had agreed to a multiyear deal in which contract engineering teams from IBM will design Cell chips for Mercury computers.
Terms were not disclosed.
International Business Machines Corp. of Armonk, New York is developing the much-anticipated cell chip with Japanese partners Sony Corp. and Toshiba Corp.
Sony plans to power use Cell to power its PlayStation 3 video console starting a year from now. Toshiba has said it plans to embed Cell chips in a line of its televisions in 2006.
IBM sees Cell driving devices in a range of industries, including medical, aerospace and automotive technologies.
"We are beginning to expand the adoption of Cell into other industries," said Raj Desai, vice president of IBM engineering and technology services -- the custom chip design unit.
PlayStation 3 is expected to be a huge hit for Sony -- selling 80 million to 100 million new consoles by 2010, according to industry analyst Richard Doherty of Envisioneering Group in Seaford, New York.
Cell is expected to offer breakthrough graphics processing improvements across the growing array of electronics that require heavy image processing, and while some analysts have questioned whether Cell will find much use beyond games, Doherty said IBM could be on to a huge winner.
"If IBM is successful sector-by-sector, Cell has a good chance that non-gaming uses will outstrip the massive volumes expected for Cell in Sony PlayStations," Doherty said.
"I think this is just the first of a half-dozen announcements IBM will make over the next year to push Cell into markets like medicine or automotive," he predicted.
Doherty said IBM's Cell chip might be used in an innovative automotive suspension system from high-end audio maker Bose, which could use Cell's heavy digital signal processing capacity to help smooth automobile rides.
The Bose system was set to be offered in 2007 model year cars by an automaker outside the United States, he said, declining to say which one.
Embedded computer chips used to control everything from air conditioners to washing machines to cars vastly outnumber the number of chips used in computers or video consoles, although they are typically sold at far lower cost.
Mercury is looking for Cell chips to accelerate the graphics-handling and image-rendering powers of its devices designed for use by doctors, pilots and others who require picture-perfect electronic displays to do their jobs.
"It's a choice of either using advanced technology like Cell or wait until the generally available technology catches up," Mercury Chief Technology Officer Craig Lund said.
Mercury, a $250 million-a-year maker of embedded computer systems, believes Cell will deliver three- to four-times faster performance than rival chips set to be on the market in the next few years, Lund said.
Mercury currently uses a range of chips from IBM, Intel Corp. and other embedded chips in its graphics-hungry embedded computer systems. The company was looking at Cell as the basis for many of its future products, Lund said.
It envisioned building magnetic scanners that give doctors access to instantaneous digital images of internal tissues during surgery. Current scanners take hours to detail such images.
