Forbes Column

May 19, 2020
New Chip Advancements Highlight 5G Momentum

By Bob O'Donnell

While some have tried to imply that momentum around 5G has slowed because of the impact of COVID-19, looking at major new chip advances from companies like Qualcomm and MediaTek suggest a very different perspective. In fact, developments seem to be moving forward at a rapid pace.

Mediatek, for example, just unveiled its Dimensity 820, an SOC (System on Chip) that includes the company’s own sub-6 GHz 5G modem, as well as an Arm based octa core CPU featuring four Cortex-A76 “big” cores, an Arm Mali G57-based GPU, and neural network processors. The 820 comes shortly after the debut of the Dimensity 1000 family, Mediatek’s first 5G-native SOC that’s expected to power soon-to-be-released phones from Oppo, One Plus and others in Asian markets. What’s interesting about the Dimensity 820 is that it offers support for dual 5G SIMs, which could be of interest in many Asian countries, where dual SIM usage is quite popular.

Qualcomm, for its part, recently unveiled the Snapdragon 768G SOC—an enhancement over its previous Snapdragon 765—which includes a faster performing Arm Mali-based GPU and Cortex A76-based CPU that’s optimized specifically for mobile gaming (hence the G at the end of its name). The Snapdragon 768G, like the 765 before it, also supports 5G via the integrated X52 5G modem, which unlike the Mediatek offering, works with both sub-6 GHz and mmWave versions of 5G.

Much less known, but arguably just as relevant, is Qualcomm’s continued work and momentum on its combined RF (Radio Frequency) front end and antenna modules for 5G phones. These components are what allow modems to connect to the new frequency bands that have been enabled in the 5G NR (New Radio) specification and are at the technical core of new 5G networks. Qualcomm recently announced that its RFFE (Radio Frequency Front End) components are now powering ten different 5G phones from 7 vendors released in the first half of this year.

Frankly, while the specific details of these latest announcements are important, the real meaning of them is lost on most people (unless you’re a smartphone engineer or someone who tracks the semiconductor industry very closely). Thankfully, it’s what they enable that really matters: lower-cost options for 5G modems and other critical components. This, in turn, allows smartphone vendors to create lower-cost, 5G-enabled smartphones—an absolutely essential step for 5G advancements, particularly because of the economic uncertainties that the pandemic has caused.

One of the biggest challenges facing the 5G market to date has been that most of the 5G-capable smartphones on the market have been priced at $1,000 or higher, which inherently limits their potential audience. That, in turn, provides less incentive for telco carriers to aggressively expand their 5G network coverage—though many of them, notably T-Mobile here in the US—have still been doing a great deal of work to kickstart that process.

Thankfully, that vicious cycle of limited device sales delaying the expansion plans of carriers can quickly be turned on its head and become a virtuous cycle where large volumes of lower cost 5G smartphones trigger even more network build out. (OK, and let’s face it, a 5G-equipped iPhone—widely expected to be announced and released sometime this fall—will certainly help.)

The important thing to remember about 5G for carriers isn’t necessarily that they want to be able to charge significantly more for 5G services—and in fact, most haven’t charged anything at all for it to date (though, realistically, that will probably change for some plans and users at some point in the future). Rather, thanks to the efficiencies enabled by 5G, the new network standard allows them to achieve the same amount of throughput levels they can with 4G LTE at a lower cost. In other words, with 5G, the cost of transmitting each bit over the wireless network goes down—hence the carriers’ strong motivation to see wider adoption of the technology.

As Samsung demonstrated with its A51 and A71 announcements from a few weeks back (see “Samsung Breaks $500 Barrier For 5G Smartphones With New A Series” for more), smartphone vendors are starting to offer lower-cost devices. Thanks to these new announcements from MediaTek and Qualcomm, we can expect to see an even broader array of lower-price options in the market by this fall and holiday season. Those should prove to be a powerful incentive for many to make the jump to 5G—even if the economic environment is still strained.

If we’ve learned anything from our current environment, it’s that good, high-speed connectivity is absolutely essential for our work, school, family and personal lives. As a result, 5G is likely to quickly move from being a nice-to-have technology to something that many are going to feel they need to have. With the lower-cost components becoming available now to make cheaper 5G smartphones a reality in the near future, that’s a momentum-driving step that many are going to be willing to take.

Disclosure: TECHnalysis Research is a tech industry market research and consulting firm and, like all companies in that field, works with many technology vendors as clients, some of whom may be listed in this article.

Here’s a link to the original column: https://www.forbes.com/sites/bobodonnell/2020/05/19/new-chip-advancements-highlight-5g-momentum/

Forbes columnist Bob O'Donnell is the president and chief analyst of TECHnalysis Research, a market research and consulting firm that provides strategic consulting and market research services to the technology industry and professional financial community.