In the market of smartphones, the leading processor makers are Qualcomm and MediaTek. Of course, we still have other players like Apple, Samsung, and even Huawei in a certain aspect. However, it is undoubtedly a fact that Qualcomm leads the Android processor market.
But, the latest market analysis report released by Media states that MediaTek has managed to overtake Qualcomm and has now become the top smartphone SoC supplier of 2020.
According to the analysis report, the Taiwanese company shipped a total of 351.8 million units to major smartphone OEMs across the world in 2020. In 2019, the company sold over 239 million units, but 2020 marks a 47.8% increase over its previous year. MediaTek’s market share jumped 10% year-over-year, from 17.2% to 27.2%.
Due to the global pandemic and US-China trade war, Huawei was banned from accessing the American-based technology, this made the Chinese tech giant seek a new supplier for its handsets. This greatly benefitted MediaTek in 2020.
“MediaTek’s growth was in key price segments as the world was impacted by the pandemic in the first half of 2020 and the smartphone market recovered in the second half of the year. Low-end and mid/low-end devices were popular with buyers. MediaTek’s ability to compete presents an alternative to Qualcomm chips in this price segment, which helped the company grow.”
According to sources, in 2019 MediaTek only had 4.3% customer share, while Qualcomm recorded a 6.1% share. However, for the year 2020, Qualcomm’s share is substantially higher than MediaTek’s (9.8% versus 5.9%) but is due to Qualcomm’s more expensive high-end chips in the market. However, analysts estimate that in 2021, MediaTek will overtake Qualcomm with (8.2% versus 7.6%).
India also reports that Xiaomi sold more devices powered by MediaTek with 63.7 million units sold – a 223.3% increase over the 19.7 million sold in 2019. Oppo was second with 55.3 million units sold, Samsung was third with 43.3 million units sold.
