The end of Huawei’s Kirin 40 chipset has given rise to a race between many processor companies to provide chipsets to Huawei.
Qualcomm is a US-based company. The restrictions implied by Trump’s government is making life difficult for Qualcomm to crack a deal with Huawei.
Huawei has confirmed that the Huawei Mate 40 will be the last phone with it’s in-house Kirin chipset. This is an amazing opportunity for Qualcomm to gain an advantage over its rivals Mediatek. This is a matter of billions of dollars and that is what they are trying to convince the Trump Government.
Qualcomm says that, due to the restrictions, its foreign competitors now have access to a market worth as much as $8 billion each year. It cites Taiwan’s MediaTek Inc. and South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co. as those benefiting from the redirected revenue stream.
Huawei is asking for a license that would allow it to sell chips for Huawei’s 5G phones. All the 5G phones lie in the high-end price range in the current market.
Qualcomm is trying their best to apply pressure on the government to somehow get this license. They are currently providing few components to Huawei as the licenses are still running and not expired.
Talking about the competitors, Samsung declined to comment to the WSJ(Wall Street Journals), while MediaTek said its investment in 5G technology has allowed it to win customers globally. It declined to identify specific companies.
If this pursuit of license fails, Huawei will be forced out of the US market and probably the market of US allies. 5G is a huge thing in the tech world for now. Lagging behind in the race could cause huge problems for Huawei. But this could affect vice-versa too, If Qualcomm fails to provide the chips, the US economy will have to suffer some loss. Huawei will somehow find another chipmaker but Qualcomm will and the US will lose a huge opportunity.