Qualcomm

A group of U.S. chip companies, including Intel, Qualcomm, Micron, and AMD, have today sent a letter to President Joe Biden to request "funding for incentives," while Apple supplier TSMC is undertaking a considerable expansion as chip demand outstrips supply (via Reuters). The letter to the President asked for "substantial funding for incentives for semiconductor manufacturing" to be...

Qualcomm today introduced the Snapdragon X65, the world's first 10 Gigabit 5G modem and antenna system for smartphones, enabling theoretical data speeds up to 10 gigabits per second. Apple will likely use the Snapdragon X65 in 2022 iPhones. While real-world download speeds will likely remain far below the peak of 10 gigabits per second, devices equipped with the Snapdragon X65 should see...

Qualcomm has reached an agreement to acquire Nuvia, a chip startup company founded by former Apple chip designers, for $1.4 billion, in an effort to compete with Apple and Intel (via Reuters). Nuvia was founded by three former Apple chip designers that worked on the A-series chips for the iPhone. Among Nuvia's key projects is a custom CPU core design set to be used in servers, but Qualcomm ...

Qualcomm today shared benchmark results for the Snapdragon 888 SoC that will be used in flagship Android phones coming out in 2021, and it's not able to keep pace with the A14 chip in the iPhone 12 models, nor the A13 in the ‌iPhone‌ 11. AnandTech compared Qualcomm's benchmarks to benchmarks of Apple's devices, with the ‌iPhone‌ winning out in Geekbench 5 and GFXBench tests. The...

The popularity of iPhone 12 models has led to soaring demand for Qualcomm's 5G modems and RF chips, helping to propel the chipmaker's revenues past that of rival Broadcom in the third quarter of 2020, according to Taiwanese research firm TrendForce. Qualcomm reported $4.9 billion revenue in the third quarter, a 37.6% increase over the year-ago quarter, compared to $4.6 billion for Broadcom....

Apple is now developing its own cellular modem that will be used in future devices and that will eventually replace modem components sourced from Qualcomm, reports Bloomberg. The information was shared by Apple's senior vice president of hardware technologies Johny Srouji at a town hall meeting with Apple employees."This year, we kicked off the development of our first internal cellular...

Qualcomm earned $8.3 billion in revenue in the fourth quarter of 2020, according to the company's earnings report that was shared today. That's up 73 percent from the fourth quarter of 2019, with Qualcomm's strong performance due in part to the 5G chips used in the iPhone 12 and other smartphones on the market. As reported by The Wall Street Journal, Qualcomm CEO Steve Mollenkopf said that...

In April 2019, Apple and Qualcomm announced an agreement to dismiss a long-running legal battle between the two companies worldwide, paving the way for Apple to use Qualcomm's 5G modems for its iPhone 12 lineup and beyond. Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon X60 modem is built on a 5nm process A teardown video shared earlier today revealed that Apple is using Qualcomm's Snapdragon X55 modem in...

Qualcomm today scored a major victory in its ongoing antitrust battle with the FTC, winning an appeal that will prevent the San Diego company from having to renegotiate its licensing agreements with smartphone makers. Back in May 2019, the Federal Trade Commission won an antitrust lawsuit against Qualcomm, with the court ruling that Qualcomm's "no license, no chips" model that allowed...

Qualcomm today unveiled its latest fast charging standard, Quick Charge 5, which it says can charge a smartphone from 0 to 50 percent in five minutes, or to full in 15 minutes. According to Qualcomm, Quick Charge 5 is the world's fastest commercial charging solution, supporting more than 100W of charging power for smartphones. In addition to offering much faster charging, Quick Charge 5...

Apple is widely expected to release its first 5G iPhones later this year, and multiple sources have indicated that these models will be equipped with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X55 modem, including analyst Ming-Chi Kuo and the Nikkei Asian Review. To the contrary, a paywalled snippet from DigiTimes today claims that Apple's chipmaking partner TSMC will begin manufacturing A14 chips and Snapdragon ...

Qualcomm this week introduced the Snapdragon X60, its third-generation 5G modem for mobile devices. The company says the first 5G smartphones featuring the X60 are expected to launch early next year. Built on a 5nm process, the X60 packs higher power efficiency into a smaller footprint compared to its 7nm-based predecessor, the Snapdragon X55. In the context of an iPhone, this could allow...

Apple is designing the antenna module that will be used in its 5G iPhones in-house because it was unhappy with the version that Qualcomm designed, reports Fast Company, citing a source with knowledge of Apple's plans. Apple reportedly "balked" at the design of the QTM 525 5G millimeter-wave antenna module offered by Qualcomm because it "doesn't fit into the sleek industrial design Apple wants...

Apple and Qualcomm are working to launch a new 5G iPhone as fast as possible, Qualcomm President Cristiano Amon said at Qualcomm's Snapdragon Tech Summit this week, reports PCMag. The main goal of Qualcomm's renewed relationship with Apple is to get the iPhone launched on time, with rumors suggesting Apple's 5G iPhones are going to come in the fall of 2020. "Priority number one of this...

Apple has arranged for a representative to meet with Taiwanese touchscreen-related manufacturer GIS next week to discuss development of an iPhone with an under-display fingerprint scanner for release as early as next year, according to a pair of reports from the Economic Daily News. The reports claim that Apple plans to use Qualcomm's ultrasonic fingerprint sensor technology in at least one...

Intel today announced it has completed the sale of the majority of its smartphone modem business to Apple for $1 billion following regulatory approval. The transaction was first announced in July and includes intellectual property, equipment, and approximately 2,200 Intel employees joining Apple. The deal sees Apple acquire a large portfolio of wireless patents from Intel. Apple now holds...

Apple yesterday announced that it has agreed to acquire the majority of Intel's smartphone modem business. The $1 billion transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2019, subject to regulatory approvals. Understandably, the acquisition may enable Apple to accelerate development of its own 5G modem, with Reuters citing a source who claims the iPhone maker wants to have an...

The FTC today won its antitrust lawsuit against Qualcomm over the chipmaker's anticompetitive business practices. As first reported by legal expert Florian Mueller on his blog FOSS Patents, U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh has ruled that Qualcomm's so-called "no license, no chips" model, under which the chipmaker has refused to provide chips to companies without a patent license, violates...

The Information has published a lengthy look into Apple's seemingly deteriorating relationship with Intel in terms of iPhone modems, leading to Apple's rekindled relationship with rival chipmaker Qualcomm last month. The report claims that Apple's frustrations with Intel's modem efforts began much earlier than some previous reports had indicated, and involved struggles with modems for the ‌iP...

The Samsung Galaxy S10 and the new OnePlus 7 Pro are both flagship smartphones that are designed to compete with the iPhone XS Max, and to see how their LTE chips compare, PCMag teamed up with Cellular Insights to test the signal strength of the new devices. Apple's ‌iPhone‌ XS Max is equipped with an XMM7560 modem chip from Intel, while the Galaxy S10 and the OnePlus 7 Pro are using...