Qualcomm SnapDragon, Mediatek, Intel – The Processors Powering Your 3G / LTE SmartPhones – MWC 2014

Qualcomm-64Bit-mwc2014At the MWC 2014 Barcelona, Qualcomm maintains its leadership with Snapdragon 800 at Tier 1 OEMs, has added 64-bit / octa-core to its 600 series and has 15 of the 22 featured TD-LTE devices by China Mobile in their early stages. Qualcomm also rounded out its mid-tier portfolio with a Snapdragon 600 series that will bring an octa-core into the family in 2H14. Most of the High End SmartPhones unveiled in MWC 2014 are powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon mobile processor.

Qualcomm continues to get a near-clean sweep on LTE designs, remaining the lead processor with its Snapdragon 800 across Samsung, LG, Sony, and HTC and its LTE modem locked-in at Apple. The company is also leading on the early 3G in China, with 15 of the 22 featured TD-LTE devices by China Mobile from Qualcomm (versus four for Marvell and three for Hi-Silicon).

Mediatek led off the show with a press event highlighting its Everyday Genius campaign based on a growing class of quality smartphones in a new super mid-tier, ranging from US$79 to US$399, broadening mainstream global access to advanced Internet connectivity and communications. Mediatek expects to be 80% of volumes and shift customer perception of it from a low-end China solution provider to a global mass-market provider. The company also launched a MWC site with social networking feeds and booth pictures to raise exposure. Mediatek formally launched a microcontroller processor for the wearable market with low power connectivity.

Mediatek rolled out mass-market quad-core 64-bit LTE chipset for 4Q14 (MT6732). The product is competitive with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 410, including quad-core 64-bit ARM A53 at 1.5GHz, ARM Mali T760 GPU, LTE CAT 4 modem and 5 mode support (TD/FD/W/TD/EDGE, 1080p and H.265, 13 MP camera with multimedia software (picture in picture, video in video and video face beautifier. The chipset eases concerns about Mediatek’s time to market and competitiveness as LTE reaches volume later in 2014.

Mediatek has also expanded its new family on 3G to also now include a 6-core (MT6591) and quad-core (MT6588) in addition to the octa-core. The new chips drew less press than LTE but are substantially more important for volumes at over 90% of emerging markets this year.

Intel’s roadmap for its mobile processors was consistent with its analyst day, with 22nm 64-bit Merrifield Atom dual core standalone application processor and separate LTE modem (CAT 6 with carrier aggregation on shelves in 2Q14) from the Infineon team. A quad-core will follow in 2H14 (Moorefield) and Cherry Trail will take it to 14nm in late 2014. Intel will finally have its first integrated baseband and AP (SoFIA) for 3G in 2H14 and LTE in 1H15.

ARM expects embedded chipsets such as automotive, smart card and microcontroller to witness a 9% CAGR to 27 bn units by 2018.

The State of 64 Bit Mobile Computing Paradigm
The 64-bit capability is rolling out aggressively alongside LTE as it pushes into emerging markets. While 64-bit is a marketing tool ahead of Android application support of the 64-bit addressing, ARM notes several other enhancements to its 64-bit (ARM v.8) instruction set including 10% performance uplift, double the multimedia engine bandwidth for graphics and audio, extra security instructions and better software compilers.

Wearable Computing Kick-Starts at MWC 2014
Samsung launched three smart watches (Gear 2/ Gear Neo / Gear Fit), all based on Tizen OS (versus Android at previous version) at the show and several Chinese vendors are now sporting an array of Android watches based on
Mediatek’s chipset.