Qualcomm

It’s now 15 years since the last of Apple’s award-winning “I’m a Mac/I’m a PC” ads, but rival companies still believe it’s clever to use the Mac actor to try to sell rival products.

After Huawei and Intel, Qualcomm is the latest company to make the attempt, with an incredibly cringeworthy ad in which the Mac guy – played by Justin Long – decides it’s time to get a PC …

Apple announced last year that it would extend its agreement with Qualcomm to continue using the company’s 5G modems until 2026. However, as Apple’s plans to build its own modems have been thwarted, it will continue to use Qualcomm’s modems in the iPhone until 2027 at least.

A sketchy report claims that plans to design an in-house Apple 5G modem chip have been abandoned, after the company struggled to make progress with the project.

It follows a series of reports describing the challenges faced by the company, including one which suggested that the project was proving a “spectacular failure” …

Apple has been doing a great job with its Apple Silicon “M” chips for computers, as they deliver more performance without consuming too much power. On the other side, Qualcomm and Microsoft have been trying to develop a competitor to the Apple Silicon Macs. While the first attempts were unsuccessful, it seems that Qualcomm’s latest CPU has finally beaten Apple’s M1 and is catching up with M2 in terms of performance.

Attempts to design an Apple modem chip to replace the Qualcomm radio chips used in iPhones have been ongoing since at least 2018 – but some five years later have been deemed a failure by engineers who worked on the project.

Even by last year, the chip Apple managed to produce was found to be slower than Qualcomm ones, prone to overheating, and so large it would have occupied more than half the space inside an iPhone …

Qualcomm is harassing Apple execs by calling them as witnesses in an unrelated lawsuit, according to lawyers for the Cupertino company.

Apple has asked for subpoenas to be withdrawn, accusing the chipmaker of simply seeking revenge for past disputes between the two companies …

While Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo predicts that the iPhone SE 4 will be the first iPhone with Apple’s own in-house modem, it’s unclear when the company’s flagship devices will make the switch. Currently, Apple relies on Qualcomm for the 5G modems it uses in its devices.

Apple has been reportedly developing a so-called iPhone SE fourth-gen, but a new report affirms that no such product will ship. iPhone SE 4 was said to resemble the iPhone XR and iPhone 11 physical design, but include 5G connectivity and other modern specs. Being canceled rather than delayed is said to predominantly benefit Qualcomm.

Apple has been developing its own modem chips for iPhone, and some reports suggested that the company would start using them as soon as 2023. However, a statement from Qualcomm suggests that Apple will keep using third-party modems rather than its own chips for the 2023 iPhone models.

See the update at the bottom of the piece.

The iPhone 15 was expected to be the first lineup to use an in-house Apple 5G chip instead of the Qualcomm ones used in current models. A recent report suggested that this won’t be the case because Apple has hit problems with the design, but a new analysis suggests that this is only half-right.

Which is to say, there is a problem with the Cupertino company’s attempt to dump Qualcomm in favor of an Apple modem chip, but it’s a legal one, not a technical one …

Chipmaker Qualcomm bribed Apple to the tune of billions of dollars, according to a European Union antitrust finding back in 2018. But a European court has now ruled that the case was not proven, and has overturned the billion-dollar fine imposed at the time.

The fact that Qualcomm paid billions of dollars to Apple is not in dispute; the issue is whether these payments influenced the iPhone maker’s choice of chip company …

Qualcomm will beat M2 chips in the laptop and desktop PC sector, claims the company’s CEO, thanks to expertise from three former Apple Silicon engineers.

It’s a claim we’ve heard before, of course, from both Qualcomm and Intel in relation to the M1 chip …

The lengthy and aggressive Apple/Qualcomm patent dispute was eventually settled back in 2019, but the legal battle isn’t quite over yet.

That’s because there was an ongoing Qualcomm appeal relating to one of the patents challenged by Apple, and that case has quietly rumbled on in the background …

Earlier this year, noted Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said that the Apple-designed chip journey would continue as the company worked on developing its own modem chip, and that we might see this as early as 2023. A new report today echoes this, but seems more confident about the 2023 date.

Apple currently uses Qualcomm for its modem chips, but has for many years been unhappy about this …

Qualcomm said earlier this month that it thinks it can beat Apple Silicon, and now Intel has made the same claim – thanks to a combination of new technology and rebranding.

Intel said that it expects to take the lead by 2025 …

Qualcomm can beat Apple’s M1 chip, says the company’s CEO, for one good reason: It has a team of chip architects who formerly worked on Apple Silicon. This includes former A-series chip lead Gerard Williams.

You may recall Apple was so upset at Williams leaving the company that it sued him, accusing him of exploiting Apple tech and poaching other key engineers…

Nvidia announced last fall that it was officially starting the process of acquiring Arm Holdings from SoftBank for $40 billion. In the months since we’ve seen concerns from competitors and the deal hasn’t yet been approved or shut down by regulators. Now Qualcomm has shared that if the sale to Nvidia is blocked, it and others would invest in Arm.

Qualcomm announced today that it has completed its acquisition of Nuvia, a startup founded in 2019 by three former engineers from Apple’s silicon team. The deal is worth $1.4 billion, and it will bolster Qualcomm’s efforts to compete with Apple Silicon and create custom-designed CPUs.

UK iPhone owners could be in line for a payout from Qualcomm, if legal action by a major British consumer association succeeds. Each owner of an iPhone or Samsung smartphone bought since the beginning of October 2015 could receive around £30 ($42).

Qualcomm is accused of abusing its dominant position in the modem chip business to overcharge Apple and Samsung, which then passed costs on to consumers…

Back in September, Nvidia confirmed that it was going to move forward with the process of acquiring Arm Holdings from SoftBank for $40 billion. However, with regulators around the world looking into the deal, it’s surfaced that Qualcomm has been vocal with authorities about its objection to the acquisition.

US chipmakers sent a letter to President Biden this morning with an urgent request to make a serious investment for semiconductor manufacturing a part of his economic recovery plan. Intel and Qualcomm along with others made the case for the government to incentivize chip production in the US.