New Delhi, March 21 (IANS) | Qualcomm continues to dominate the mid-range and premium flagship market, with a market share of nearly 50 per cent across all price brackets above $300.
According to Counterpoint Research, due to the launch of the flagship Snapdragon 888 and 8Gen 1, Qualcomm’s share in smartphones priced above $500 increased from 41 percent in 2020 to 55 percent in 2021.
“Qualcomm struggled with a tight supply throughout the year for its mid-tier solutions. The shift away from 4G SoCs didn’t help either. However, in the high value $300+ segment, Qualcomm dominated with its Snapdragon 7 and 8 series ,” the report stated.
MediaTek grew from smartphones under $299 (wholesale value). MediaTek’s growth was driven by both LTE and 5G SoCs in this price band.
In Android smartphones in the $100-$299 price band, MediaTek dominated the market with a 52 percent share. This is where the Dimensity 700 and 800 saw mass market adoption of 5G smartphones in markets such as China, India and the US and parts of Europe. This allowed brands like Realme, Xiaomi, Oppo and Vivo to launch 5G phones for less than $200.
The Dimension 1100/1200 helped MediaTek increase its share in the $300-$499 price band, where it achieved 24 per cent volume share in 2021, compared to 6 per cent in 2020.
Furthermore, with the launch of the Dimension 8100/8000, it is looking to consolidate its position in the $300-$499 price band.
Meanwhile, Qualcomm’s next-generation flagship processor, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, will reportedly support AV1 decoding.
The chip’s internal codename is SM8550, which matches the codenames for other Snapdragon 8-series chipsets. SM8450 Gen 8 for Snapdragon 8, SM8350 for Snapdragon 888, and so on.
AV1, or ‘Aomedia Video 1,’ is an open, royalty-free coding format designed for transmitting video over the Internet.
Unlike Samsung’s Exynos flagship SoCs from 2021 and 2022, Qualcomm’s current chips do not support native decoding of AV1 video.
-IANS
a/sb/
