Behind the competition of mobile phone manufacturers, chip giants compete for 5G dividends

China and Africa News, February 28, although this year’s MWC Communications Conference was cancelled, the pace of the 5G chips released by the technology giants is still the same, but the form of online press conferences is selected. The 5G in 2020 has attracted much attention because the industry generally believes that this will be the key point for the increase in construction scale and the rise of the 5G market.

In order to seize the 5G market, major mobile phone manufacturers are showing off their muscles. Behind the competition among mobile phone manufacturers, the competition among major chip manufacturers has become increasingly fierce. Ziguang Zhanrui, which has missed the 4G bonus, is actively deploying 5G, and the mobile phone terminal equipped with its 5G chip has finally been officially launched.

Nowadays, under the epidemic situation, the 5G chip market is still hot, and new products have been released frequently in the past two weeks. On February 26, Ziguang Zhanrui released its new generation of 5G SoC chip Tiger Ben T7520. On the same day, Qualcomm released the Snapdragon XR2 platform and 8cx 5G chipset. On February 18, Qualcomm also released the third-generation 5G modem and radio frequency system Snapdragon X60.

TrendForce analyst Yao Jiayang told reporters: “In terms of 5G SoC performance, it can be divided into several levels: the processing performance of the CPU itself for the application, the AI ​​computing power, and the download speed of the built-in 5G Modem. These three parts will be the focus of the competition of major manufacturers. Broadly speaking, comparing 5G SoC with 4G SoC, the performance of these three parts has been significantly improved. In 2020, major manufacturers will also use this in principle. Three aspects of performance to be strengthened.”

While the performance is improving, each company has also accelerated the commercialization of 5G chips. 5G chips from Qualcomm, Huawei, Unigroup Zhanrui, Samsung, and MediaTek have all been commercialized on mobile phones.

A new round of 5G chip competition

At present, the companies that have launched 5G baseband chips for mobile phones are Huawei, Qualcomm, Samsung, MediaTek and Ziguang Zhanrui. In addition to Qualcomm, the other four have launched 5G SoC chips that integrate baseband chips.

Among them, 5G baseband chips include Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X50, Snapdragon X55, and the newly released X60; Huawei’s Balong 5G01 and Balong 5000; Ziguang Zhanrui’s Ivy V510, MediaTek’s Helio M70, and Exynos Modem 5100.

The 5G SoC chips that have been released mainly include Huawei Kirin 990; Samsung Exynos 980 and Exynos 990; MediaTek Dimensity 1000 and Dimensity 800; Ziguang Zhanrui Tiger Ben T7520 and T7510.

The latest products to enter are Qualcomm’s X60 and Ziguang Zhanrui’s Tiger Ben T7520.

Ziguang Zhanrui said that Huben T7520 is the second-generation 5G smartphone platform of Ziguang Zhanrui. It adopts 6nm EUV process technology. While performance is improved, power consumption has reached a new low. At the same time, Huben T7520 supports full-scene coverage, 5G NR TDD+FDD carrier aggregation, and uplink and downlink decoupling technology, which can increase the coverage by more than 100%. It supports Sub-6GHz frequency band and NSA/SA dual-module network, and also supports 2G to 5G seven-mode full Netcom. In SA mode, the downlink peak rate exceeds 3.25Gbps.

Yao Jiayang analyzed to reporters: “Because this processor uses TSMC’s 6nm EUV process, it is currently the industry’s first 5G SoC that is confirmed to adopt this process. At least it can be confirmed that Unigroup Zhanrui has been able to catch up in advanced manufacturing processes. The footsteps of major manufacturers such as Qualcomm and Huawei. However, based on the current product planning of Huawei and Qualcomm, it should be based on 5nm EUV. Therefore, although Ziguang Zhanrui has caught up with the footsteps of major manufacturers such as Qualcomm, it must It may take some time to go side by side.”

He also said that from the perspective of CPU and GPU configuration and 6nm EUV and other specifications, Ziguang Zhanrui’s strategy should still lock the mid-range and low-end markets first, and the specifications of 5G Modem still do not support mmWave. Look, T7520 should be locked in China’s mid-range 5G mobile phone market.

Look at the Qualcomm Snapdragon X60. According to reports, the Snapdragon X60 is the world’s first 5nm process and the world’s first 5G baseband that supports aggregation of all major channels and their combinations. Supported channels include millimeter wave and FDD and FDD below 6GHz. TDD frequency band. In terms of speed, the Snapdragon X60 can achieve download speeds of up to 7.5Gbps and upload speeds of up to 3Gbps. Compared with solutions that do not support carrier aggregation, carrier aggregation in the frequency band below 6GHz in independent networking mode can double the peak rate of 5G independent networking.

Qualcomm said it plans to sample the Snapdragon X60 in the first quarter of 2020, and smartphones using the Snapdragon X60 are expected to be launched in early 2021.

And this year, Qualcomm’s commercial use of mobile phones is mainly based on X55 with baseband chips. Yao Jiayang told reporters: “From the perspective of the development of the 5G mobile phone market in 2020, there are processors and 5G Modem collocations, as well as 5G SoC (integrated 5G Modem). ) Of the two, 865+x55 is just one combination. For example, 765/765G will be Qualcomm’s main 5G products this year. Compared with X55, X60 does not have much specification upgrades, which is roughly the process. And the introduction of mmWave and sub-6GHz carrier aggregation technology.”

Commercial competition upgrade

On the one hand, the technology of 5G chips is being updated. Yao Jiayang told reporters: “In the long run, 5G chips will still develop towards an integrated route. The plug-in method is currently a transitional approach. We believe that the development of 5G SoC will be everyone’s will Keep up with Qualcomm’s footsteps, try to integrate the functions of mmWave into the 5G SoC, while adopting more advanced manufacturing processes. If the technology develops, the 5G SoC that integrates 5G Modem should become the mainstream in 2021.”

At the same time, manufacturers also mentioned more about the commercial situation and user experience at the press conference, and these chips are gradually moving towards the commercial use of mobile phones, CPE, PC and AR/VR.

Mobile phones are currently the most widely used terminal. So far, mobile phone manufacturers have launched more than a dozen 5G mobile phones. Ziguang Zhanrui also announced for the first time that its 5G chip will be carried in Hisense F50 mobile phones, and Qualcomm is the most widely used in the Android industry.

The latest research report released by Strategy Analytics pointed out that by 2020, global 5G smartphone shipments will reach 199 million units. However, the impact of the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic and the global economic slowdown will limit the sales of 5G smartphones this year.

Ken Hyers, Director of Strategy Analytics, said: “The global 5G smartphone shipments in 2020 will increase more than tenfold from 19 million units in 2019 to 199 million units. The 5G market segment will become the fastest growing global smartphone industry this year. Part. Consumers want faster 5G smartphones to experience richer content, such as videos or games. We predict that the 5G penetration rate will increase from 1% of all global smartphone shipments in 2019 to 15% in 2020. “

Neil Mawston, Executive Director of Strategy Analytics, added: “The 5G smartphone market in the first half of 2020 will be much weaker than expected, but we expect that if the epidemic is brought under control, the 5G smartphone market will rebound strongly in the second half of the year.”

In addition to mobile phones, Huawei, Zhanrui, etc. have launched CPE products, and Qualcomm also released the second-generation 5G chip platform in VR/AR glasses-Snapdragon XR2, and the 5G chipset used on the ARM PC side-Snapdragon 8cx.

Yao Jiayang analyzed to reporters: “XR2 is a high-end product in Qualcomm’s positioning, and 8cx is also a high-end product in the 5G PC field. We believe that the current development of the 5G market is still in its infancy. Commercial, but the overall number is still relatively limited. We believe that the maturity of the VR/AR and 5G PC markets, conservative estimates may have to wait until 2021, when the consumer market gradually accepts the convenience brought by 5G, before they have the opportunity to slowly spread. “

As chips become more and more mature, who can ultimately reduce power consumption, lower costs, and successfully commercialize the card slot, becoming the first echelon, and it is also the focus of everyone’s attention in the 5G mobile era.

2020 is an important node for large-scale commercial use of 5G. According to previous predictions, in 2020, 170 operators worldwide will realize 5G commercial use. Major countries and regions will cover 5G networks, and the number of 5G users will reach 170 million; by 2025, the number of global 5G users will reach 1.77 billion.

However, the new coronavirus pneumonia epidemic has also delayed the development of 5G users and the popularity of 5G mobile phones to a certain extent. Chu Qing said that as a chip designer, Zhan Rui has little internal influence, but the overall mobile phone industry has a significant impact, especially downstream Terminal manufacturers, “A smart phone has more than 400 parts, and none of the parts can be shipped. It does have a significant impact on the entire industry, and even some companies may only have a production capacity of 25%.” However, he also It is pointed out that enterprises have also responded positively to the government through multiple channels, and the current situation is improving.