Sales Rise at Freescale Semi

"We design, build and sell chips; and the chips don't know if they're public or private," he said.

Cell phone giant Motorola(MOT Quote) -- Freescale's former parent company -- seems to have taken a shine to public chips lately, though.

On Monday, Texas Instruments(TXN Quote) announced a "strategic relationship" to provide custom-developed chips for Motorola's 3G cell phone handsets.

Mayer said Freescale continued to have a strong relationship with Motorola, particularly for high-end 3G phones.

As more of Motorola's cell phones become 3G phones, however, Mayer said it's to be expected that other companies would get a piece of the business.

"I never expected that we would get 100% of Motorola's silicon spend," Mayer said.