Last week’s news that ARM server startup Calxeda wasn’t going to make it brought out the inevitable fears that ARM servers might not be able to deliver.

Calxeda’s demise had more to do with first mover disadvantages as well as the fact that the company had to wait on 64-bit chips. The company raised over $90 million for a very R&D heavy effort, and really this could turn into a classic case of a well capitalized server maker rolling up, buying all that IP on the cheap, and timing the market better than Calxeda could.

With regard to the 64 bit question, Gigaom’s Derrick Harris writes:

The 64-bit architecture is critical to adoption because it includes more than the 4 gigabytes of addressable memory that many enterprise applications require. However, while many applications require more memory, many — especially web and data-processing apps — don’t often require the computing horsepower the market-dominating Intel Xeon chips provide. The idea of ARM in the data center is so popular in part (arguably entirely) because of how much a lower power footprint could reduce energy consumption.

I think 64 bit matters, if for the most basic reason that having those chips available in servers would allow enterprise applications to be tested and validated on ARM servers, further opening up the market.

Companies like Applied Micro, Dell, and HP will now have to carry the ARM server torch as Intel tries to fend off threats with Intel Atom chips optimized for the data center.