Application Processor Export
Samsung Electronics has been focusing on securing non-memory semiconductor technologies, and its effort is finally paying off. The company has raised the self-sufficiency rates of a major semiconductor part in Galaxy smartphones. Also, it is likely to supply the part to the world’s eighth-largest smartphone maker.
According to industry sources on Sept. 22, Samsung Electronics’ self-developed mobile application processor (AP) Exynos chip is highly likely to be used to produce a new smartphone model of the TCL Corporation, the leading electronics company in China and one of the top 10 smartphone manufacturers in the world.
It could be the TCL P650M, a low-end phablet with a large display. Samsung Electronics flatly said, “We cannot disclose information about our clients.” A mobile AP plays a role as the brain that controls the performance of a smartphone.
After jumping into the smartphone business, TCL has rapidly improved its market share and has become one of top 10 smartphone producers in the world. The company took over the mobile phone businesses of French firm Alcatel and U.S. firm Hewlett-Packard, and is selling mobile phones with these brands around the world.
TCL has a 3 to 4 percent share in the global smartphone market, and it is the eighth-largest smartphone maker as of the second quarter in terms of the overall mobile phone business, including feature phones, according to market research firm Gartner.
Industry watchers believe that TCL, which has been supplied mobile APs from semiconductor companies like Qualcomm and MediaTek, has also decided to get chips from Samsung Electronics, recognizing Samsung’s technology competitiveness in the non-memory sector.
Samsung Electronics has been focusing on securing a design technology of a central processing unit (CPU), commonly referred to as the “brains” of a computer and the integration of cutting-edge semiconductor technologies, for the last 20 years. Ushering in the era of smartphones, the company is developing its own mobile AP called “Exynos” based on this.
Since the company thinks that the self-developed chip now has competitiveness with Qualcomm, it has decided to put its Exynos 7420 chip in all models of the Galaxy S6 series, which are released this year, increasing self-sufficiency rates. Recently, Samsung Electronics is supplying the chip to some Chinese low-end smartphone makers like Meizu.