Annually, flagship smartphones in the United States and other countries launch with processors designed by Qualcomm. Look at any flagship smartphone released in the last few years and it is almost guaranteed that a Snapdragon processor is inside. The Snapdragon 810 was expected to be the go-to processor for hardware manufacturers this spring, but reports of technical difficulties including overheating caused some to believe otherwise. Today, the company confirmed that a key customer has walked away from using the Snapdragon 810.
The key customer, while not named by Qualcomm, is likely Samsung. We have seen reports and rumors that Samsung is looking elsewhere for the processor to be used in the Galaxy S 6 in select countries. Samsung is one of the few companies that develops its own processors and that means there is a chance to replace the Snapdragon 810 and go against Qualcomm with Exynos.
Samsung may have backed away from using the Snapdragon 810 due to a potential lawsuit between Qualcomm and LG. Yesterday, a source familiar with the situation made it clear that LG would seek legal action if Qualcomm modified the Snapdragon 810 for Samsung. Why? Because the Snapdragon 810 will power the soon-to-be-released G Flex 2. Well, LG also believes that there is no overheating.
In addition to a key customer dropping the Snapdragon 810, Qualcomm announced that its business in China has underperformed despite settling a licensing payments dispute in the country. The Chinese National Development and Reform Commission has repeatedly gotten in front of Qualcomm and the company believes that has caused Chinese customers to not properly report sales.
Qualcomm reduced its financial estimates for the next two quarters because of the ongoing issues.
Source: Re/code
Come comment on this article: Qualcomm confirms a key customer dropped its Snapdragon 810 processor
Visit TalkAndroid for Android news, Android guides, and much more!
