Challenge
When the Khronos Group announced the introduction of the Vulkan open standard for 3D graphics and computing, they promised to provide higher performance and more balanced CPU and GPU usage. Through a lower-level API, that would allow parallel tasking, developers would have the means to distribute work among multiple CPU cores.
Given the potential benefits this had for real-time video games and interactive media, one leading mobile GPU vendor wanted to ensure its customers could embrace this new Vulkan standard.
This posed a challenge, however, as the vendor didn’t just need to deliver a working Vulkan driver – they needed to deliver it to market quickly and avoid any risk that it would fall behind its competitors.
To meet a strict deadline, the company needed to scale its own internal driver development resource with a reliable partner that could supply a full team of skilled graphics developers that understood the Vulkan project.
Solution
The vendor selected Mobica due to the depth and breadth of our knowledge in silicon and embedded systems. We also have a strong understanding of the open standards set by the Khronos Group; Mobica is a member of the Khronos Vulkan working group, which defines standards for GPU acceleration.
We provided the vendor with a scrum team of highly skilled engineers that was able to take the technical lead. We initially offered support by working on the API layer, but as the project progressed the scope of the project expanded.
The team supported the development of new features and provided maintenance of the driver stack for Android and Linux. This has included debugging and performance optimisation for various test suites and use cases.
Result
More than five years on from the initial project and the vendor is still utilising the strong technical expertise supplied by Mobica for the development of its Vulkan driver stack.
Our scrum team of 8-10 engineers continues to work autonomously, supporting ongoing optimisation and maintenance.
“The ability of our internal development team to work closely with Mobica on the Vulkan driver has helped ensure the ongoing success of this project.”
