The two companies also try to illustrate that the deal is all about "Intel's computing strategy," aligning with the "Internet connectivity pillar" of the business, along with improving "Wi-Fi and 4G WiMAX offerings" by leveraging fix exe errors "Infineon's 3G capabilities" and that it all "supports Intel's plans to accelerate LTE." But the real reasoning behind the deal is all about Intel's complicated relationship with Apple and Microsoft--it's coded into this bit from the press release: "The acquired technology will be used in Intel Core processor-based laptops, and myriad of Intel Atom processor-based devices, including smartphones, netbooks, tablets and embedded computers." Apple and Intel partnered up several years back when the computer maker made a huge switch away from its IBM PowerPC CPU architecture. Since then, the two have been close collaborators for chips inside Apple's Mac-based computers--even seeing a one-off special-edition low profile chip being designed by Intel for the first-generation MacBook Air. But remove spyware tips the fastest growing portion of Apple's business has been the iPod, iPhone, and iPad mobile-devices sector, and these devices (which have overturned three different markets) don't use Intel chips: The iPad in particular is a challenge to Intel's dominance of the portable PC market, and it even uses Apple's own-branded ARM-architecture A4 CPU, and has been selling like hot cakes. With Apple's moves into this market, Intel's execs must've been getting antsy, and back in July there was even some thinking that Apple could buy Infineon and really ratchet-up its vertical integration to challenge Intel directly. Intel and Apple's relationship is complicated. And now its got more so. Meanwhile drivers database Intel's long term "best friend" Microsoft has been seeing its dominance over the high-tech world take bigger and bigger hits: Its smartphone business has all but fallen into the toilet bowl, and the netbook phenomenon succeeded based on an old (and increasingly aged-looking and PR-damaging) Microsoft product--XP. And now the netbook phenomenon looks like its being overtaken by the tablet PC revolution, led by Apple and a horde of Android file extension database clones. Microsoft's big hope to grab some of the limelight back are its Windows Phone 7 series devices, and tablet-friendly Windows 7 OS. If Intel can get itself into Microsoft's good books, and offer powerful battery-friendly CPUs and lots of the base-band electronics for smartphones that are specifically tailored to MS requirements, then maybe its Intel's in-route to the mobile device market.