5 ms·

Raspberry Pi Receives Strategic Investment from Sony Semiconductor Solutions

42 points by donutshop 4y ago

snvzz 4y ago
Remember when Raspberry Pi was a not-for-profit organization? Me neither.
- Crosseye_Jack 4y ago
  Raspberry Pi have always had a profit and non-profit sides. The profit side deals with actually selling pi’s and feeds its profits into the nonprofit.
  - snvzz 4y ago
    This does not feel right nor legally sound immediately. I am hopeful somebody knows how Raspberry Pi is structured and can elaborate.
    - jackweirdy 4y ago
      Raspberry pi trading limited (commercial endeavour) is >80% owned by the raspberry pi foundation (another investor and now Sony own the remaining 20%)
rektide 4y ago
This world would be so much more kick ass if random companies like Sony were just screwing around producing low cost but neat-ish RISC-V chips. That's the real investment we want/need.
gjsman-1000 4y ago
If I’m Sony, I know that anything AI related is a nascent field. Turning the Raspberry Pi 5? into a state of the art dev board for my solution, with higher end custom boards for people who need them or just want enterprise support, seems like a no brainer. A win-win. Plus, that really, really helps with getting broad community support off the ground. Making my solution the community solution of choice is extremely valuable.
- pg938hkd 4y ago
  [dead]
- snvzz 4y ago
  I'll be sad if the Raspberry Pi 5 is anything else than RISC-V. In part because 5 is the perfect number for this, but mostly because it would mean that the foundation has already lost touch with reality and the direction the industry is going, and is drifting into irrelevance. SBCs that are compliant with RISC-V specs, have good driver upstreaming efforts and are highly competitive with the Raspberry Pi series such as the VisionFive 2 and Star64 have already hit the market. They aren't as fast as the rpi4 in the CPU side, but the CPU is still faster than the 3b+'s and everything else in the SoC including the GPU is much better, with higher power efficiency and using standard usb-pd power supplies. Nevermind the fact they use standard RISC-V boot process rather than bespoke garbage. Whereas the Sipeed LM4A TBA this month has a RISC-V CPU that is significantly faster than the one in rpi4 and 400 and is still competitively priced with options under $100.
  - gjsman-1000 4y ago
    I won't be sad. Not just because RISC-V's CPU is still not all there (but could be in another generation or two), but also the software, the lack of backwards compatibility with older Pis, the increased cost of that chip that even with 2 additional CPU cores doesn't quite beat the Pi 4, it's just not tenable right now. There's also no way the Pi Foundation will use it, as the moment they use a standard chip instead of something proprietary Broadcom, they lose a lot of their unique value and become interchangeable with any other board. "standard RISC-V boot process rather than bespoke garbage" AKA It has UEFI. You can get UEFI on a Raspberry Pi as well with TianoCore, even if it isn't quite as complete and requires Pi-specific because ARM is a mess. However, ARM has a specification for that, SystemReady, which is slowly rolling out. If the Raspberry Pi 5 were SystemReady compliant at a higher level (one can dream), then we could have unified images just like a PC. Also, be careful what you wish for. RISC-V, despite all the hype, is just an instruction set. UEFI compatibility is optional. Open-source drivers are optional. Not having Secure Boot is optional. If you want to add your own proprietary instructions, you can do so. Apple could remake their own M1 with RISC-V while having the drivers and firmware support be just as complicated as with ARM and not one ounce simpler. Heck, Apple could switch the iPhone's next chip out with RISC-V and still keep their App Store monopoly and iOS-only boot process intact. "standard usb-pd power supplies" The Raspberry Pi 4 fixed that problem in an unannounced hardware revision years ago. Revision 1.2 in 2020. "competitively priced with options under $100" AKA 3 times as expensive as they need to be. Not good enough. It's hard enough for kids to fork over $35, let alone $90. By $90 it's a completely different product for a completely different market.
b800h 4y ago
Feels like a misstep. It's been nigh-on impossible to source Raspis for ages. Perhaps they needed the cash.
- cinntaile 4y ago
  How is it a bad thing to invest in something where the demand far outstrips the supply?
  - b800h 4y ago
    Because that wasn't the problem. Had the raw materials been available, supply would have continued and the company would have been making a lot of money. I assume that inability to ship would have led to difficulty paying staff. Could be wrong on that score, but it was a sound business in its own right, and personally I don't like to see profitable British companies being sold abroad.
asicsp 4y ago
Dupe? "Sony backs Raspberry Pi with fresh funding, access to A.I. chips" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35536303 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35536303 (115 points | 6 days ago | 91 comments)
AraceliHarker 4y ago
This partnership is only about improving the integration between the image sensor AITRIOS sold by SSS and the Raspberry Pi.
shashashasha___ 4y ago
raspberry pi isn't for private consumers for 3 years or so. no reason pi4 should cost 130$ they can state 35 in their website all they want, but lies just drive me further away. I use some Chinese boards with armbian instead. wish i could use the pi, but... they don't care about private consumers

42 points by donutshop 4y ago

snvzz 4y ago

Remember when Raspberry Pi was a not-for-profit organization? Me neither.

Crosseye_Jack 4y ago
Raspberry Pi have always had a profit and non-profit sides. The profit side deals with actually selling pi’s and feeds its profits into the nonprofit.
- snvzz 4y ago
  This does not feel right nor legally sound immediately. I am hopeful somebody knows how Raspberry Pi is structured and can elaborate.
  - jackweirdy 4y ago
    Raspberry pi trading limited (commercial endeavour) is >80% owned by the raspberry pi foundation (another investor and now Sony own the remaining 20%)

rektide 4y ago

This world would be so much more kick ass if random companies like Sony were just screwing around producing low cost but neat-ish RISC-V chips. That's the real investment we want/need.

gjsman-1000 4y ago

If I’m Sony, I know that anything AI related is a nascent field. Turning the Raspberry Pi 5? into a state of the art dev board for my solution, with higher end custom boards for people who need them or just want enterprise support, seems like a no brainer. A win-win. Plus, that really, really helps with getting broad community support off the ground. Making my solution the community solution of choice is extremely valuable.

pg938hkd 4y ago
[dead]
snvzz 4y ago
I'll be sad if the Raspberry Pi 5 is anything else than RISC-V. In part because 5 is the perfect number for this, but mostly because it would mean that the foundation has already lost touch with reality and the direction the industry is going, and is drifting into irrelevance. SBCs that are compliant with RISC-V specs, have good driver upstreaming efforts and are highly competitive with the Raspberry Pi series such as the VisionFive 2 and Star64 have already hit the market. They aren't as fast as the rpi4 in the CPU side, but the CPU is still faster than the 3b+'s and everything else in the SoC including the GPU is much better, with higher power efficiency and using standard usb-pd power supplies. Nevermind the fact they use standard RISC-V boot process rather than bespoke garbage. Whereas the Sipeed LM4A TBA this month has a RISC-V CPU that is significantly faster than the one in rpi4 and 400 and is still competitively priced with options under $100.
- gjsman-1000 4y ago
  I won't be sad. Not just because RISC-V's CPU is still not all there (but could be in another generation or two), but also the software, the lack of backwards compatibility with older Pis, the increased cost of that chip that even with 2 additional CPU cores doesn't quite beat the Pi 4, it's just not tenable right now. There's also no way the Pi Foundation will use it, as the moment they use a standard chip instead of something proprietary Broadcom, they lose a lot of their unique value and become interchangeable with any other board. "standard RISC-V boot process rather than bespoke garbage" AKA It has UEFI. You can get UEFI on a Raspberry Pi as well with TianoCore, even if it isn't quite as complete and requires Pi-specific because ARM is a mess. However, ARM has a specification for that, SystemReady, which is slowly rolling out. If the Raspberry Pi 5 were SystemReady compliant at a higher level (one can dream), then we could have unified images just like a PC. Also, be careful what you wish for. RISC-V, despite all the hype, is just an instruction set. UEFI compatibility is optional. Open-source drivers are optional. Not having Secure Boot is optional. If you want to add your own proprietary instructions, you can do so. Apple could remake their own M1 with RISC-V while having the drivers and firmware support be just as complicated as with ARM and not one ounce simpler. Heck, Apple could switch the iPhone's next chip out with RISC-V and still keep their App Store monopoly and iOS-only boot process intact. "standard usb-pd power supplies" The Raspberry Pi 4 fixed that problem in an unannounced hardware revision years ago. Revision 1.2 in 2020. "competitively priced with options under $100" AKA 3 times as expensive as they need to be. Not good enough. It's hard enough for kids to fork over $35, let alone $90. By $90 it's a completely different product for a completely different market.

b800h 4y ago

Feels like a misstep. It's been nigh-on impossible to source Raspis for ages. Perhaps they needed the cash.

cinntaile 4y ago
How is it a bad thing to invest in something where the demand far outstrips the supply?
- b800h 4y ago
  Because that wasn't the problem. Had the raw materials been available, supply would have continued and the company would have been making a lot of money. I assume that inability to ship would have led to difficulty paying staff. Could be wrong on that score, but it was a sound business in its own right, and personally I don't like to see profitable British companies being sold abroad.

asicsp 4y ago

Dupe? "Sony backs Raspberry Pi with fresh funding, access to A.I. chips" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35536303 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35536303 (115 points | 6 days ago | 91 comments)

AraceliHarker 4y ago

This partnership is only about improving the integration between the image sensor AITRIOS sold by SSS and the Raspberry Pi.

shashashasha___ 4y ago

raspberry pi isn't for private consumers for 3 years or so. no reason pi4 should cost 130$ they can state 35 in their website all they want, but lies just drive me further away. I use some Chinese boards with armbian instead. wish i could use the pi, but... they don't care about private consumers