Embedded computer vision is one of the most important goals of the mobile chip industry, as companies race to support machine learning and deep context awareness on handsets, not just on supercomputers. Qualcomm has led the way with its Zeroth ‘brain chip’ platform, which embeds deep learning capabilities in its Snapdragon system-on-chip. Now ARM has boosted its own efforts with the $350m acquisition of Apical, a provider of imaging and embedded computer vision intellectual property. Apical fits well into ARM’s IP licensing model, as well as its ambitions to power new classes of highly intelligent devices. The smaller firm’s advanced imaging products are used in more than 1.5bn smartphones and about 300m other consumer or industrial devices, including IP cameras…