Arm’s CEO Insists the Market Needs His New CPU. It Could Piss Everyone Off

Arm just confirmed the rumors: It’s producing its own chip for the first time. CEO Rene Haas explains why this won’t alienate the many chipmakers who license the company’s designs.

Rene Haas is half-prone on a couch in his office in San Jose, California. A basketball rests in his hand, partly obscuring his face. Haas had grimaced when WIRED’s photographer first asked him to assume this position. The headlines came to him immediately: “People are going to say ‘Arm’s CEO sleeps on the job,’” he says.

Still, Haas obliges. He gives us 46 minutes of his time, then shoos us out so he can hop on a call with Masayoshi Son, the Softbank CEO and chairman of Arm’s board.

I’m meeting with Haas just days before the chip firm’s momentous announcement that it’s launching its own silicon. For a company that ...