The development of Russian processors "Baikal" is under threat

The new UK sanctions list includes Russian processor manufacturers: MCST JSC (Elbrus chips) and Baikal Electronics JSC (Baikal chips). The latter is threatened with a ban on the use of the British ARM architecture, which could stop the release of new processors. About it writes "Kommersant".

British companies are now prohibited from continuing any legal relationship with affected manufacturers. They will not revoke the licenses for intellectual property already issued by them, but new licenses are now a big question.

So, Baikal Electronics can produce processors up to Baikal S with a topology of 16 nm - they have design and manufacturing licenses. But for new chips that are under development (Baikal M2, Baikal L, Baikal S2), there are only design ones. Accordingly, the company will not be able to release them.

Experts believe that Baikal Electronics will have to look for a factory that will violate patent law, or switch to open architectures, such as RISK V, MIPS, VLIW. However, this will require redesigning the entire processor, which will take two to three years and can cost up to 1 billion rubles.