Quote from: picominer on April 10, 2018, 05:02:13 AM

Could Innosilicon have created Halong to avoid sharing its patents with BDPL?

There are strong indications that they are related in some ways. The following post summarizes the key points:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2443327.msg33551682#msg33551682

How can a startup like Halong afford to create prototype device? A mask is a multi-million dollar investment. Is it possible they acquired their chips from another manufacturer or that Halong is actually Innosilicon? My bet is on the latter.

If Innosilicon is supplying chips to Halong, shouldnt Innosilicon also be obliged to join BDPL if they manufacture chips with the AsicBoost design?

Im pretty sure, that Halong didnt design and implement a 10nm ASIC without help. Design teams capable of 10nm implementations are not coming out of nowhere.

In principle Innosilicon is a design service company. They are realizing any kind of microchips for any customer who is paying them. Normally that kind of service companies are pure-play design service, which means that they are not releasing products labelled with their company name. Innosilicon seems not to be so strict here, they have own products too.

However, I guess that Halong contracted/paid Innosilicon to implement their 10nm ASIC as a turnkey service. Halong covered the complete NRE costs, took all the risks and is the owner of the resulting ASIC design and mask-set. The engineering was done by Inno (maybe Halong developed the ASIC architecture and parts of the front-end design).
That is the way it goes, nothing really wrong here.