Everything Blueprint: Processing Po

A big source of tension between the US and China at the moment is technology. And one very small component is now at the centre of this battle for global dominance: the microchip. Controlling chip manufacturing in the 21st century may well prove to be like controlling the oil supply in the 20th. The country that controls this manufacturing can throttle the military and economic power of others.

At the heart of this battle is ARM Holdings.

Founded in Cambridge in 1990, Arm specialises in microprocessors, and dominates the global smartphone market (their designs feature in 95% of all mobile phones globally). It's a real British tech success story. But it's currently caught in the middle of a war for total control on microchips because whoever controls ARM, controls microchips.

Strong Arm describes the titanic power struggle for control of the microchip - told through the story of a British start up that has found itself in the middle. The book alternates between telling the rise of the Arm and the battle for the microchip to reveal just how important this company is