Apple has agreed to purchase PA Semi, a five-year-old manufacturer of low-power computer chips.The company was founded by one of the designers for the Digital Equipment Alpha and StrongARM microprocessors, developed in the 1990s. Its current flagship product is the PWRficient processor, a high-performance, low-power chip based on IBM's Power architecture -- which was, of course, the architecture of the chips Apple used in its Macintosh computers before switching to Intel. Apple reported paid $278 million for the company.

The acquisition triggered speculation about what Apple might use such chips for. "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not comment on our purposes and plans," said Apple spokesman Steve Dowling. The original news report pointed to the possibility that the chips could find a home in iPhones and iPods; other observers, noting that PWRficient chips are currently used in embedded systems, suggested they might turn up in AppleTV and similar products.Forbes, CNET News