With the return of the Surge chip, is Xiaomi's self-developed ISP a safe bet or a second choice?

Xiaomi's "Surge" chip, which has been silent for a long time, has finally made new progress.

Today (30), the second Xiaomi Spring New Product Conference, although the usual slogan "My heart is surging" was used when introducing the S series SoC, the product released was the Surge C1 - Xiaomi's self-developed image processing chip (ISP). This undoubtedly disappointed Mi fans who have been waiting for the S2 for a long time, but even so, Xiaomi's first professional photography chip C1 is still a historic breakthrough for Xiaomi, and may also become a key booster for Xiaomi mobile phones to reach a new level.

So, what exactly does the ISP chip do? Why did Xiaomi's milestone start with self-developed ISP chips?

What is the role of self-developed ISP chips?

ISP, short for "Image Signal Processor", is a unit used to process the output signal of the front-end image sensor. In layman's terms, what ISP does is to improve the visual level of "digital eyes" to the level of "human eyes", so that the effect of seeing digital images by human eyes is as close as possible to the effect of seeing real scenes by human eyes.

In layman's terms, the sharpening, noise reduction, and color optimization of photos that we often talk about are all processed in the ISP. In addition, today's ISP is also responsible for realizing hybrid focus operations such as phase, laser, and contrast, as well as providing support for dual cameras. An excellent ISP chip plus an excellent camera module can bring excellent imaging effects.

Mobile phone functions and even forms may have new variables, but photography is the function that most mobile phone users care about the most. In the 5G era, this trend will continue to be strengthened, which is why Xiaomi attaches so much importance to ISP chips. The Pengpai C1 released this time uses self-developed ISP + self-developed algorithm, and has more sophisticated and advanced 3A processing capabilities.

According to Lei Jun, Pengpai C1 has dual filters, which can process high and low frequencies in parallel, and improve the digital signal processing efficiency by 100%. This gives Pengpai C1 three major advantages: first, it can achieve faster and more accurate AF focusing performance, greatly improving the ability to focus in low light, small objects and flat areas; second, a more accurate AWB white balance algorithm, accurately restoring complex mixed ambient light sources; third, a more accurate AE exposure strategy, better night scene contrast and high dynamic scene performance.

Lei Jun mentioned at the press conference that the self-developed image processing chip Surge C1 released by Xiaomi was first launched on Xiaomi MIX Fold. Lei Jun pointed out that Surge C1 is a milestone for Xiaomi photography and carries Xiaomi's bigger dream.

What is the significance of self-developed ISP chip to Xiaomi?

A mobile phone SoC chip contains important IP modules such as BP (baseband chip), CUP (universal processor), GPU (graphics processor), DSP (digital signal processor), ISP (image signal processor), etc. How many IPs an IC design company has in its chips is a reflection of the strength of this IC company.

For smartphone manufacturers, it would be best if they could control all IPs. If not, gradually achieving a single breakthrough is also a strategy. Smartphone manufacturers often choose to start with self-developed ISP.

Nowadays, other technologies of smartphones are already mature, but there is still room for improvement in the camera, so smartphone manufacturers have chosen to "make a fuss" on the camera function of their phones. In addition, although the ISP chip is not as important as the SoC, it is also a key part of smartphones, and it has more cards to play when facing other competitors.

This is indeed the case. Xiaomi is not the first mobile phone manufacturer to develop its own ISP. Before it, Huawei, Apple and Samsung have already launched their own ISP processors.

Take Huawei as an example. Huawei has integrated its own ISP since HiSilicon Kirin 950. The self-developed ISP module enables Huawei to optimize photo processing from the bottom layer and present beautiful samples. Facts also prove that Huawei has become the world's top mobile phone camera since P9.

Therefore, it is not difficult to understand why Xiaomi chose to start with self-developed ISP chips. Before Xiaomi developed its own ISP, it had been using Qualcomm's ISP chips, which were updated once a year and could not keep up with the speed of Xiaomi's imaging progress. If Xiaomi has its own self-developed ISP, then it does not have to worry about the differences in ISPs of different brands of chips, and can ensure that products on different platforms can have similar or even the same imaging performance, which also virtually reduces the cost of manpower and R&D.

In addition, compared with developing SoC, developing ISP is much easier, which is easier for Xiaomi's semiconductor business. In the long run, Xiaomi can start from ISP and gradually transition to more self-developed chip fields to further enhance the autonomy of chips. Later, when the business matures, Xiaomi can also extend the coverage of self-developed chips from mobile phones to more fields.

More importantly, if you want to develop the high-end smartphone market, you must develop your own chips. The mobile phone industry is already very mature. How to differentiate in a homogeneous market? Chips are one of the important symbols, and they are also a symbol of the company's R&D technology strength and an important bargaining chip for marketing.

Apple, Huawei, and Samsung, which dominate the high-end smartphone market, all have strong capabilities in developing their own chips. Apple uses Qualcomm’s baseband chips and ARM architecture, but also uses its own key CPU, GPU, NPU, DSP, and ISP. Samsung’s baseband chips, DPS, ISP, and AI are all self-developed. Huawei’s ISP, AI, and baseband chips are also its own.

Xiaomi, on the other hand, is relatively weak in chips. The outside world has always questioned that "Xiaomi phones do not have independent technology" and the impression of Xiaomi phones is that they are "mid-to-low-end". If Xiaomi wants to tear off this label, it must show its own R&D strength.

After seven years of chip development, Xiaomi is still on the road

In fact, Xiaomi's journey to develop its own chips has already gone through a seven-year "Long March".

In 2014, Xiaomi began to prepare for "self-developed chips". In the same year, Pinecone Electronics was established as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Xiaomi, mainly engaged in semiconductor chip research and development.

After three years, on February 28, 2017, Xiaomi officially released its self-developed chip "Peng Pai S1" and the first smartphone equipped with the processor, Xiaomi 5c, and also launched the low-end smartphone Redmi 4X. The launch of the Peng Pai S1 has attracted a lot of attention. For Xiaomi, this is the first step to "becoming a great company."

However, even though the performance of Pengpai S1 "looked good" at the press conference, the market response of Pengpai S1 was not good. In the end, the Xiaomi 5C was taken off the shelves in less than half a year.

After the unsuccessful Pengpai S1, the industry is looking forward to the arrival of Pengpai S2. However, there has been no news about Pengpai S2. In October 2019, a netizen asked Xiaomi executives about the progress of the chip. Xiaomi executives replied with four words: "It's worth looking forward to."

Until the release of Xiaomi 10 in 2020, some Mi fans asked Lei Jun whether he would still develop the Surge chip. Lei Jun said that the chip research and development encountered difficulties, but he did not give up the research and development of Surge.

Since the launch of Pengpai S1 in 2017, Mi fans have waited for four years. Although they did not wait for Pengpai S2, they have at least waited for the return of the self-developed chip.

In fact, Xiaomi's pursuit of chips has not stagnated in the past few years. While insisting on independent research and development, Xiaomi has also consolidated its own technological foundation by investing in the chip industry. In 2017, Xiaomi established the Hubei Xiaomi Yangtze River Industrial Fund with a scale of approximately RMB 12 billion to support the business expansion of Xiaomi and Xiaomi's ecological chain companies, mainly investing in semiconductors and smart manufacturing and other related industries. According to Qichacha data, Xiaomi Industrial Fund has invested in 35 semiconductor-related companies. Among them, Hengxuan Technology was listed in December 2020, and GalaxyCore and Aojie Technology have also applied for listing on the Science and Technology Innovation Board.

Xiaomi's annual R&D investment has basically maintained an annual growth rate of about 30-40%. Lei Jun also said recently that in 2020, Xiaomi's R&D investment was nearly 10 billion yuan, and this year we expect it to increase by more than 30%, expected to exceed 13 billion yuan.

Conclusion: Without accumulating small steps, one cannot reach a thousand miles; without accumulating small streams, one cannot form a river or sea. In any case, Xiaomi's self-developed chips are "late but finally arrived". The return of Xiaomi chips this time brings new hope for Xiaomi's self-developed road, and it is also a proof of Xiaomi's technical strength. After seven years of twists and turns on the road of self-developed chips, fortunately, Xiaomi is still on the road.