Dec 16, 2016 09:42 AM EST By Noi Ramirez, UniversityHerald Reporter

Apple might use Imagination Technologies' Series8XT GPU on their iPhone 8 next year touted to succeed the Series7XT, which is the base architecture for the PowerVR GT7600 in the iPhone 7.

According to analyst firm Linley Group, the iPhone 7 GPU shows that it performs the fastest among all mobile processors that operate at peak speeds. They claim that with the Series8XT, the new iPhone 8 will be much faster, perhaps, even more, energy efficient. It is known that the iPhone 7 with older GPU architecture quickly heats up if the unit runs at peak speed for a certain amount of time.

Reports say that Apple improved the performance of PowerVR GT7600 GPU by tweaking it to increase its clock speed up to 50 percent. This resulted in high-performance gains when operating at peak speeds but it cannot sustain that performance for long, according to PCWorld.

Imagination has been designing GPUs, which it licenses to companies like Apple and Intel. Apple has been used PowerVR in every iPhone up to this date and has been tuning its architecture to work more efficiently with its devices, according to The Motley Fool. Additionally, Apple is also a minority stockholder of Imagination Technologies.

PowerVR was once a prime competitor in GPU's for smartphones, but their hold in the market dimmed with the entry of ARM's Mali, based on Bitfrost, and Qualcomm's (current leader) Adreno. By far, Nvidia is still the best mobile GPU maker, but their sights are currently set on automotive and machine learning applications.

This area for growth is also being targeted by PowerVR to stamp itself and play a role in self-driving vehicles. They are developing algorithms and said to be demonstrating neural networks that run on GPU computing. Likewise, PowerVR is mixing up its MIPS CPU for use in drones and robots that rely heavily on visual computing and image analysis.

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