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> There's no sense of communicating difficulties, or any sense of humility. If there's any difficulties, that would be financial, no? Does SiFive publish any f

> There's no sense of communicating difficulties, or any sense of humility. If there's any difficulties, that would be financial, no? Does SiFive publish any financial reports? And if so, do those show the company is in financial trouble? Are there well-informed insiders claiming so? Unless that, I'll take the company CEO's word for it. Who writes: "We are very well funded for years to come, with engaged, highly supportive investors, and we are realizing revenues and compounding royalties from many of the world’s leading semiconductor companies." There. So if no money trouble, then what? RISC-V ecosystem growth slowing down? No. SiFive's customers shopping elsewhere? Seems unlikely. Portfolio growing stale/uncompetitive? Hardly. Revenues not (yet?) matching expenses? Who knows. It's a young company still, in a rapidly evolving market. More likely imho: SiFive transitioning from seed stage -> investment rounds & rapid growth -> some kind of 'maintenance mode'. They have an IP portfolio now. So developing that is done. And decided to re-adjust the size of their workforce to better fit what's needed near-future. Leaving 'just' 100s of highly skilled people to work on SiFive's next products. All in all, looks more like a storm in a glass of water to me. It's sad for the people who were laid off, but they'll have good opportunities elsewhere.

klelatti 3y ago
> RISC-V ecosystem growth slowing down? No. Or (their business) not growing as rapidly as they planned or expected and so they have fallen short on their own financial projections and need to adjust. Need to be careful not to conflate SiFive with RISC-V (despite the best efforts of this blog post to do so). They have made their own decisions as to where to compete and that may or may not be the right strategy. SiFive's success or otherwise has implications for RISC-V but RISC-V being a success doesn't imply SiFive will be.
sifar 3y ago
>> They have an IP portfolio now. So developing that is done. Perhaps if you knew semiconductor IP business, you would not say this. It is never done. Stop creating or improving new IPs, and you'll become irrelevant.

klelatti 3y ago

> RISC-V ecosystem growth slowing down? No. Or (their business) not growing as rapidly as they planned or expected and so they have fallen short on their own financial projections and need to adjust. Need to be careful not to conflate SiFive with RISC-V (despite the best efforts of this blog post to do so). They have made their own decisions as to where to compete and that may or may not be the right strategy. SiFive's success or otherwise has implications for RISC-V but RISC-V being a success doesn't imply SiFive will be.

sifar 3y ago

>> They have an IP portfolio now. So developing that is done. Perhaps if you knew semiconductor IP business, you would not say this. It is never done. Stop creating or improving new IPs, and you'll become irrelevant.