Smartphone System-on-Chip (SoC) shipments fell 20.8 percent to 307 million units in China last year, according to CINNO Research (via CNBC). Qualcomm suffered heavily as it saw a year-on-year decline of 48.1 percent. As a result, its market share dropped to 25.4 percent from 37.9 percent in the year prior.
It is believed that U.S. sanctions on Huawei are hurting Qualcomm. The Chinese giant previously used to equip some of its devices with Qualcomm’s chips. When the US began its crackdown, Huawei intensified its focus on its chipmaking arm HiSilicon and this made the subsidiary the number one smartphone chip provider in China in the first half of 2020.
MediaTek chips are also believed to cost less than Qualcomm’s chip, which makes them a good fit for domestic players’ strategy of making reasonably priced high-specced phones.
This (is) not only because (of) the excellent performance of MediaTek’s mid-end platform, but also, it is undeniable that the U.S. has imposed a series of sanctions on Huawei & Hisilicon, forcing major manufacturers to seek more diversified, stable and reliable sources of supply.” – CINNO Research.
