Poor power consumption shuts Intel out of cellphone biz

Wired's Priya Ganapti explains why Intel's silicon isn't found in cellphones:

Intel is being held back in the mobile sphere by its inability to offer power consumption on par with ARM's chips, say analysts. Add to that the notion that Atom is untested for mobile phones and the fact that many proprietary mobile-phone operating systems are not compatible with Intel's x86 architecture, and it makes breaking into the cellphone market an uphill climb.

Cellphones are another world compared to computers, power-wise. A few watts of consumption, as might be pitched for the most efficient Atom-based netbooks, is still far more grunt than a handset needs (or could power for long, given their tiny single-cell batteries). After a few attempts at buying market share, Intel now intends to expand the Atom lineup in 2010 to include cellphone-ready chips. [Wired]