MediaTek has seen a sizeable growth in the smartphone chip market in recent months. Now, a new report has revealed that the company has managed to capture a record 43 percent market share for its AP (application processor)/ SoC (System on Chip) shipments for smartphones.

As per a Counterpoint Research report, the Taiwanese chipmaker’s SoC and AP shipments grew by a robust 31 percent year on year in the second quarter of this year. The growth arrives due to the explosive growth of shipments for 5G enabled smartphones over the same period last year. Thus, the company held a dominating 43 percent market share for SoCs in Q2 2021, with its LTE chips also seeing high shipments.

Meanwhile, Qualcomm was affected by the component supply issues and lower yields. However, it still managed to dominate the 5G baseband modem shipments with a 55 percent market share. Furthermore, the brand has also realigned its component sourcing strategy that should help boost its supply and overall earnings. Samsung, on the other hand, only managed to seize 10 percent of the 5G baseband shipment market share and also slipped into the fifth position with a 7 percent share for total SoC shipments falling behind Apple and UNISOC that held 14 and 9 percent market shares respectively.

Research Director Dale Gai stated that “MediaTek dominated the smartphone SoC market with its highest ever share of 43%, driven by a competitive 5G portfolio in the low mid segment and without major supply constraints. Relative to Qualcomm, MediaTek benefited from less supply constraints in the first half of 2021, including with RFICs (radio frequency integrated circuits), power management ICs (PMIC), and stable production yields from TSMC. 4G SoC shipments further helped MediaTek to strengthen its leading position.”

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After Huawei had its chip supply from TSMC cut off, the Chinese company had started looking into multiple alternatives. One such alternative was the known chipmaker MediaTek, which would supply the smartphone maker with 5G chips. But it seems the deal isn’t exactly set in stone as MediaTek has yet to promise chip supply to Huawei.

According to a new report, MediaTek hasn’t confirmed the increased chip supply order, keeping the current situation in mind. In view of the recent sanctions by the US Government and the related human resource investment the chipmaker would have to make for Huawei, it seems that the deal has not been confirmed. At the moment, MediaTek has declined to comment on this situation or the rumors.

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A few sources close to the industry also pointed out that Huawei had already received 5G base stations and mobile processor 5nm chips from TSMC, even before the US sanctions had been proposed. In other words, the Chinese tech giant has a sufficient stock for now, which should also aid in development for the next two years. Thus, the short term business opportunities for others in the mobile chip business, like MediaTek, is relatively low.

Furthermore, the recent policies being enforced by the US may also hinder the supply of chip giants like Qualcomm and MediaTek, both of which are known suppliers of 5G enabled mobile processors. Notably, another major concern the industry faces is that while the new regulations do not impact the chipmakers directly, they may soon hinder their 5G operations if they function against the best interest of the US government.

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It is well known that the smartphone market has seen slight stagnation in recent times. This also translates to the mobile chip industry as well, with the global cellular baseband processor also seeing a decline of 3 percent (year on year over 2018) in 2019. However, during the overall decline, 5G enabled chipset saw growth to 2 percent market share during this period.

2019 was the year that 5G networking broke out into the market. In its nascent stages, the premium grade flagships were the only handsets that housed chipsets that supported the newer and faster bandwidth. Despite this, the market saw decent success and even managed to gain an overall market share of 2 percent. Furthermore, the growth was facilitated by early adopters, which includes Qualcomm with its 5G modems in its Snapdragon processors, Huawei with its HiSilicon Kirin flagship processors and even Intel.

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Qualcomm held the most dominating position for 5G enabled chipsets, with 41 percent market share. HiSilicon came in second with a 16 percent market share while Intel came in third with 14 percent. The rest was made up of by various other brands, but these three are the major contributors by far. Prior to the Coronavirus pandemic, it was expected that 5G would become more mainstream in 2020. And despite it all, the trends showcase that brands are still placing an emphasis on 5G over 4G, especially new and flagship models.

During this same period, 4G LTE baseband shipments have declined year on year for the first time. The only exceptions to this are Intel and Unisoc, while other players in the market all seeing a fall. Only time will tell now regarding just how far reaching the effects of COVID-19 actually is, and what it may mean for the market overall in 2020. So stay tuned.

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As tensions between Huawei and the US Government are rising, the Chinese company is looking for more ways to reduce reliance on the west. Due to this, Samsung and MediaTek are both eyeing 5G mobile chip orders from Huawei, since it plans on moving away from Qualcomm later this year.

For those unaware, Samsung, similar to MediaTek, is also a major manufacturer of mobile chipsets. At the moment, there are only 4 major 5G mobile chip makers in the world, including Qualcomm, MediaTek, Samsung, and Huawei. Huawei develops and ships its own HiSilicon Kirin 5G chip ranges on its flagship smartphones, which are processed by TSMC.

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Now, it seems that the Chinese tech giant may look for other alternatives as well, with Samsung and MediaTek being viable options. The former is known for its Exynos chips while the latter released its Dimensity lineup of 5G mobile processors. Notably, Qualcomm’s Vice President, Hou Mingjuan, stated that the 5G market is relatively unaffected by the recent pandemic and will still see a high demand and growth rate this year.

This means that 5G networking and its corresponding technology will still be sought after by OEMs. Thus, companies like Huawei will require a large number of 5G chips for its flagship series or even lower and mid range handsets if it does plan on buying SoCs from other manufacturers. Although, it still remains to be seen what direction Huawei plans on taking, amidst the growing pressure from the US.

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We recently reported that the China-based Huawei, which is among the very few smartphone manufacturers who make their own chipsets, could be open to supply 5G chips to Apple.

For those who are unaware, Huawei develops its own processors under the Kirin brand for the Huawei and Honor branded smartphones. But, its chipsets are not sold to other smartphone makers and are limited to Huawei and Honor smartphones only.

In a recent interview with CNBC, Huawei CEO confirmed that the company is open to selling its 5G chips to Apple. In the same video, he can be seen praising Apple and the western management style, which helped the company grow further.

Supplying chips to its biggest rival Apple is a surprising move from Huawei as the company’s executive had previously said that the Huawei chipsets are for its own internal products such as phones and IoT devices.

Huawei’s Balong 5000 modem chip supports both mmWave and sub-6GHz 5G networks. It is also compatible with 4G LTE, 3G, and 2G networks. The Balong 5000 5G modem chip will debut on Huawei’s first phone to support the next generation of wireless connectivity — Mate X, which also happens to be the company’s first foldable smartphone.

Apple is currently in a tight spot with its current chipset supplier — Intel which supplies wireless modems for iPhones and iPads. It’s 5G-ready XMM 8160 modems would be available for its customers in the second half of 2019. But a report claims that Apple has “lost confidence” in Intel after the world’s largest chipset manufacturer failed to meet certain development deadlines.

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The development comes at a time when China-based tech giant Huawei is aiming to dethrone Apple and Samsung to grab the top spot in the global smartphones market share. However, Huawei comes to Apple’s side when Qualcomm and Samsung both have refused to provide their 5G modems to Apple. While Qualcomm’s denial is understandable given their ongoing legal battle, Samsung refused to supply by citing lack of supply for its Exynos 5100 chips.

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