Manufacturers started putting more than one CPU, or "core", on a single chip to make it faster.
Within a few years, 100 million to one billion transistors are expected to reside on a single chip.
Multiple applications can be executed on a single chip, by dynamically reconfiguring the hardware on chip from one application to another as needed.
A small computer employing microprocessors based on a single chip.
It will take the company another technology generation to place everything on a single chip.
And to do all that on a single chip, offering seamless communication.
Capacity is expected to reach about 50 gigabytes on a single chip in the next half-decade.
"As we move toward placing entire computing systems on a single chip, the need to optically clock microelectronic circuits will become crucial," Mr. Doherty said.
He said that many complex manufacturing problems would have to be solved before a phone could be created on a single chip.
Mr. Wilson noted that Texas Instruments had also moved to combine functions on a single chip and that its processor had been well received by the market.
As a result, the company said that it would focus on other ways to improve microprocessor performance, most notably by stamping multiple processors on a single chip.
