Apple's 5G modem could land in 2023 iPhone, Kuo says

I want to see these chips land on MacBooks.

I feel like I’ve read this article before. 

"As Android sales in the high-end 5G phone market are sluggish, Qualcomm will be forced to compete for more orders in the low-end market to compensate for Apple's order loss."

This doesn't make a lot of sense. 5G modems appeared on high end phones over 2 years ago and have become progressively more widespread since then. 'sluggish' is a wishy washy term without due context (industry wide, the chip shortage, COVID related, saturation...?). They are already available in the €250 price band and by 2023 they will be in the low end and probably have a huge new 5G IoT market to take advantage of too.

The deal to supply Apple was never part of QC's wider strategy. It was simply a 'bonus' that had a finite period of application. On top of that QC will continue receiving payments from Apple for every 5G modem that Apple makes.

In that context there is nothing required to 'compensate' for the 'loss' because QC probably never contemplated having Apple's business in the first place. Circumstances simply brought a deal to the table which they accepted. QC will simply continue its roadmap just as it was.

Even today (let alone 2023) with 5G modems having been on-SoC for a while now, the competition is tied to the general chipset market and not so much 5G modems themselves.

In that context, Samsung will definitely have something to say by the time 2023 comes around and Huawei certainly will, the second sanctions are lifted or they get their own manufacturing up to speed. Whichever comes first. Then of course there is Mediatek which I believe is the current smartphone chipset leader (although perhaps I'd have to confirm that to make sure) .

Kuo's prior item on this subject predicted Apple's proprietary 5G in 2022 or 2023. This one says 2023 at the earliest, but maybe later. I'm still trying to figure out how the oft-applied "more accurate than most" honorific for Kuo is calculated. Seems like Kuo's most oft-reported notes lately are corrections of prior notes. Mind you, I totally get that the pandemic has screwed things up for everyone, and that it also appears that Apple may actually be releasing decoy info that gets picked up by prognosticators, but I'm just trying to figure out how any one analyst gets commonly noted as better at this than other analysts.

avon b7 said:

"As Android sales in the high-end 5G phone market are sluggish, Qualcomm will be forced to compete for more orders in the low-end market to compensate for Apple's order loss."

This doesn't make a lot of sense. 5G modems appeared on high end phones over 2 years ago and have become progressively more widespread since then. 'sluggish' is a wishy washy term without due context (industry wide, the chip shortage, COVID related, saturation...?). They are already available in the €250 price band and by 2023 they will be in the low end and probably have a huge new 5G IoT market to take advantage of too.

The deal to supply Apple was never part of QC's wider strategy. It was simply a 'bonus' that had a finite period of application. On top of that QC will continue receiving payments from Apple for every 5G modem that Apple makes.

In that context there is nothing required to 'compensate' for the 'loss' because QC probably never contemplated having Apple's business in the first place. Circumstances simply brought a deal to the table which they accepted. QC will simply continue its roadmap just as it was.

Even today (let alone 2023) with 5G modems having been on-SoC for a while now, the competition is tied to the general chipset market and not so much 5G modems themselves.

In that context, Samsung will definitely have something to say by the time 2023 comes around and Huawei certainly will, the second sanctions are lifted or they get their own manufacturing up to speed. Whichever comes first. Then of course there is Mediatek which I believe is the current smartphone chipset leader (although perhaps I'd have to confirm that to make sure) .

There isn't a chance in hell of China getting leading edge fabs operational by 2025, let alone 2023, and given that sanctions are unlikely to be lifted, I'm not seeing Huawei making a comeback in flagship phones.

Germany and Huawei;

https://www.politico.eu/article/germany-europe-huawei-5g-data-privacy-cybersecurity/

Huawei's telecom looks to have been shut down, for all practical purposes, in Germany.

Meanwhile, the EU investment agreement with China appears to have been derailed:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-05/europe-knits-together-strategies-to-hold-the-line-against-china

"The European Union signaled it won’t ratify an investment agreement with China as long as its officials are sanctioned in a clash with Beijing over alleged human rights abuses, as the bloc set out strategies to counter state-funded Chinese takeovers.

“The ratification process cannot be separated from the evolving dynamics of the wider EU-China relationship,” Valdis Dombrovskis, the bloc’s trade chief, told reporters on Wednesday, calling China’s retaliatory sanctions against officials including members of the European Parliament “unacceptable and regrettable.”

Foreign State Aid

• The EU Commission unveiled proposals to curb potentially unfair foreign state support to companies. “We will act assertively when necessary to keep our economies working well,” Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager told reporters on Wednesday. Vestager said earlier that the EU needs “intrusive” rules to prevent foreign state-funded firms -- such as those from China -- from undercutting EU rivals.

Chip Production

• The commission laid out plans to diversify supply chains and carry out regular sector reviews in order to tackle the bloc’s dependencies in key strategic areas, including semiconductors. So far Europe has been “too naive, too open” about outsourcing chipmaking to countries like Taiwan, China and South Korea, Industry Commissioner Thierry Breton said in an earlier interview.

tmay said:

avon b7 said:

"As Android sales in the high-end 5G phone market are sluggish, Qualcomm will be forced to compete for more orders in the low-end market to compensate for Apple's order loss."

This doesn't make a lot of sense. 5G modems appeared on high end phones over 2 years ago and have become progressively more widespread since then. 'sluggish' is a wishy washy term without due context (industry wide, the chip shortage, COVID related, saturation...?). They are already available in the €250 price band and by 2023 they will be in the low end and probably have a huge new 5G IoT market to take advantage of too.

The deal to supply Apple was never part of QC's wider strategy. It was simply a 'bonus' that had a finite period of application. On top of that QC will continue receiving payments from Apple for every 5G modem that Apple makes.

In that context there is nothing required to 'compensate' for the 'loss' because QC probably never contemplated having Apple's business in the first place. Circumstances simply brought a deal to the table which they accepted. QC will simply continue its roadmap just as it was.

Even today (let alone 2023) with 5G modems having been on-SoC for a while now, the competition is tied to the general chipset market and not so much 5G modems themselves.

In that context, Samsung will definitely have something to say by the time 2023 comes around and Huawei certainly will, the second sanctions are lifted or they get their own manufacturing up to speed. Whichever comes first. Then of course there is Mediatek which I believe is the current smartphone chipset leader (although perhaps I'd have to confirm that to make sure) .

There isn't a chance in hell of China getting leading edge fabs operational by 2025, let alone 2023, and given that sanctions are unlikely to be lifted, I'm not seeing Huawei making a comeback in flagship phones.

Germany and Huawei;

https://www.politico.eu/article/germany-europe-huawei-5g-data-privacy-cybersecurity/

Huawei's telecom looks to have been shut down, for all practical purposes, in Germany.

Meanwhile, the EU investment agreement with China appears to have been derailed:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-05/europe-knits-together-strategies-to-hold-the-line-against-china

"The European Union signaled it won’t ratify an investment agreement with China as long as its officials are sanctioned in a clash with Beijing over alleged human rights abuses, as the bloc set out strategies to counter state-funded Chinese takeovers.

“The ratification process cannot be separated from the evolving dynamics of the wider EU-China relationship,” Valdis Dombrovskis, the bloc’s trade chief, told reporters on Wednesday, calling China’s retaliatory sanctions against officials including members of the European Parliament “unacceptable and regrettable.”

Foreign State Aid

• The EU Commission unveiled proposals to curb potentially unfair foreign state support to companies. “We will act assertively when necessary to keep our economies working well,” Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager told reporters on Wednesday. Vestager said earlier that the EU needs “intrusive” rules to prevent foreign state-funded firms -- such as those from China -- from undercutting EU rivals.

Chip Production

• The commission laid out plans to diversify supply chains and carry out regular sector reviews in order to tackle the bloc’s dependencies in key strategic areas, including semiconductors. So far Europe has been “too naive, too open” about outsourcing chipmaking to countries like Taiwan, China and South Korea, Industry Commissioner Thierry Breton said in an earlier interview.

Driving a wedge into this thread to derail it?

We have to wait and see on sanctions and China's road maps. 

The EU-China deal has in no way been derailed. Ratification is being held off. That's it. Politics.

EU Chip production. Nothing new to see here.

The goals were set out years ago with the EU processor initiative. That was created to deal with theoretical situations like the ones Trump ended up making real.

Chip manufacturing is a branch of those goals which from day one were to reduce technological dependencies outside the EU.

The subject comes up for review periodically and, given the current situation, may be accelerated. China and the US are doing exactly the same.

Most of the above doesn't really have much to do with the thread though does it? So better to stick to the topic.