MediaTek was the top chip manufacturer in the fourth quarter of 2023 as 117 million smartphones were shipped with its silicon during the October through December period. That was a 21% increase year-over-year for the chipmaker whose flagship chip, the Dimensity 9300 application processor (AP) had a unique configuration. The Octa-core SoC carries four Cortex-X4 Prime CPU cores and four Cortex-A720 Performance CPU cores. No low-power CPU cores are found inside the Dimensity 9300 AP.
Based on the number of smartphone units shipped during Q4, MediaTek was the top chipset vendor worldwide
Top smartphone chip vendors by phone units old (top) and phone revenue (bottom)
Huawei’s HiSilicon unit was the beneficiary of Chinese foundry SMIC’s production of the 7nm Kirin 9000s for the Huawei Mate 60 series. This was the first 5G SoC made for Huawei since U.S. export rules revised in 2020 blocked Huawei from obtaining 5G chips from foundries that use American technology. As a result, HiSilicon chips were packed inside 7 million smartphones during the fourth quarter of last year, a stunning 5,121% hike year-over-year.
Based on the revenue of phones shipped globally, Apple was the top chip vendor during Q4
Phones powered by Qualcomm’s processors raked in $30 billion during Q4, good enough for second place despite a 2% decline. MediaTek had a nice 22% increase in the revenue collected from phones that used its chipsets during the fourth quarter as that figure hit $23 billion. Huawei’s HiSilicon was next and with an incredible 24,471% increase year-over-year, the revenue of phones shipped with HiSilicon chipsets came to $7 billion during the fourth quarter.
