According to a report from China’s Taiwan Economic Daily, MediaTek’s CEO revealed for the first time yesterday that their latest 5G flagship chip will be released in the first quarter of next year. They hope the chip to come before the Chinese New Year.
Recently, Qualcomm released its annual 5G flagship chip ‘Snapdragon 888’. In this regard, Cai Lixing said that MediaTek will also launch new products later, officially igniting the first wave of war in the field of mobile chips in 2021.
Taiwan media pointed out that the industry expects that the various 5G chips that MediaTek will launch next year should be produced using TSMC’s 5nm or 6nm process.
However, because TSMC’s advanced process production capacity is very tight, especially the 5nm process, almost all related production capacity has been underwritten by Apple in the near future. Therefore, when MediaTek can receive TSMC’s 5nm process support in the future, it will affect the supply of subsequent chips.
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Cai Lixing said that the global 5G smartphone penetration rate is expected to reach 18% this year, with a chance to further increase to 49% in 2022, and to nearly 60% in 2023.
5G Era Has Come
Recently, IDC expressed optimism about the growth of the smartphone market in the fourth quarter. The market research company pointed out that the growing demand for 5G smartphones was the main driving force. The overall shipments are expected to grow 2.4% year-on-year, reaching to 377.7 million units. This upward trend should continue in 2021, an increase of 4.4% from 2020. Though the planet is ‘infected’, the ‘astonishingly fast recovery of the supply chain’ and ‘significant incentives’ from OEM and 5G terminal channels will make the market grow again.
IDC calls 5G ‘the current driving force of the industry’. By 2020, shipments of compatible terminals are expected to account for nearly 10% of the overall shipments. This proportion should increase to 29% in 2024.
However, the company pointed out the key factor for the future growth of 5G (model) shipments. The terminal costs are close to or the same as 4G smartphones. It expects the average selling price of 5G (model) in 2020 to be US$611. Also, it should drop to US$453 by 2024.