01-22: Sorry for absent yesterday, these 2 days – Apple’s complaint comes after the U.S. Federal Trade Commission also filed a lawsuit against Qualcomm; Qualcomm denies saying the lawsuit is baseless; etc.
Chipsets
Digitimes Research estimates the majority usage of application processor (AP) in 2016~2020 is still for smartphones, with more than 80% share. For MediaTek and Spreadtrum the share goes up to 90%, indicating these companies do not diversify their products and resource. 2016~2020 APs overview: Qualcomm share goes up, MediaTek slightly goes down, Spreadtrum slightly goes up, HiSilicon doubles. (Laoyaoba, Digitimes)
Apple’s complaint comes after the U.S. Federal Trade Commission also filed a lawsuit against Qualcomm, accusing the company of forcing Apple to buy wireless chips in exchange for better royalties. Apple accuses Qualcomm of withholding nearly USD1B in payments. (Android Headlines, Apple Insider, CNBC, CN Beta)
Qualcomm suggests that Apple’s ‘baseless’ attacks were behind the FTC’s charges, something the company accuses it of spurring on “by misrepresenting facts and withholding information.” (Laoyaoba, Yahoo, Softpedia, TechCrunch)
Touch / Display
KGI analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says that Apple’s new OLED iPhone will use a flexible display panel, which will likely allow it to curve around the sides of the main chassis. However, this makes it incompatible with the existing 3D Touch pressure sensors seen in the iPhone 6s and iPhone 7. (CN Beta, 9to5Mac, Laoyaoba)
Samsung reportedly filed an arbitration request with the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) in New York City after its 3 former partners stopped supplying it with LCD panels. Kuroda Electric’s statement suggests that Samsung is demanding USD429M in damages from all 3 suppliers combined, though no further details on the dispute have been revealed. (Laoyaoba, TechNews, Reuters, Android Headlines)
Battery
Samsung hired 3 quality-control and supply-chain analysis firms to conduct an in-depth investigation and the apparent conclusion was that the batteries produced by Samsung SDI were irregularly sized that did not fit the phone properly whereas the one produced by ATL was flawed due to a “manufacturing issue” due to the ramp up of production after Samsung stopped using its affiliate produced batteries. (WSJ, Sammy Hub, TechNews)
Biometrics
KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo believes Apple is developing a new class of bio-recognition technologies including facial recognition that play nice with “full-face” or zero-bezel, displays. Specifically, Kuo foresees Apple replacing existing Touch ID technology with optical fingerprint readers. (Apple Insider, CN Beta, Engadget)
Smartphones
Xiaomi founder Lei Jun shares the focus of the company in 2017. In the coming year, Xiaomi will focus on top notch tech, new retail, internationalization, AI and fintech. In particular, fintech is the first time Lei Jun mentioned to his employees. (Laoyaoba, Huanqiu, GSM Dome)
Meitu rejected claims of selling user data collected from people using its photo editing app. Meitu stated that the company is not tracking any data that Google and Apple are not, but as their tracking services are blocked in China where Meitu is located, the firm was forced to come up with a different solution for measuring the performance of its app. (Android Headlines, ZOL, Sohu, 163)
Ruminating on Apple’s recently announced lawsuit against Qualcomm for allegedly withholding USD1B in vendor rebates, RBC Capital Markets analyst Amit Daryanani. Daryanani says the roughly USD1B Qualcomm is accused of withholding impacted Apple’s gross margin by about 40~50 basis points. (Apple Insider, p5W, 163)
Microsoft is expected to conduct another round of layoffs when the company reports its quarterly earnings on January 26. About 700 jobs are expected to be impacted. Microsoft said that it planned to complete those cuts by June 2017, which is the end of Microsoft’s 2017 fiscal year. (Laoyaoba, Inquistr, Yahoo)
Huawei has retracted its patent infringement lawsuit against ZTE in China. This indicates the IP litigation disputes between both companies that has lasted for few years are reconciled for now. (Laoyaoba, Anzhuo, OfWeek)
Ben Schachter from Macquarie Research sees about 75% of total Apple gross profit through fiscal year 2021 coming from services. Gross margin gleaned on the App Store is estimated to be about 90%, AppleCare at 70%, and all other services including iTunes, iCloud, Apple Pay sitting at 64%. Services revenue is expected to grow 17% per year through 2021, hardware revenue will climb 2.4%, with a continuation of about 30% annual growth in App Stores per year. (CN Beta, Apple Insider, Street Insider)
The head of Foxconn, Terry Gou said that the rise of protectionism is unavoidable. He warned that uncertainties for this year make it tough to have a very clear analysis and outlook, but he said it was clear politics would underpin economic development. (VentureBeat, CN Beta)
Internet of Things
Sonos has a new CEO Patrick Spence, and the company wants to partner with Amazon and Google for their assistants, Alexa and Google Assistant. (Android Central, The Verge, NY Times, Android Headlines)
BYD Co plans to sell electric passenger cars in the United States in about 2~3 years, an executive said on Thursday, as it races to be the first Chinese automaker to sell cars to American drivers. (CN Beta, Reuters, Economic Times)
The University of Michigan will collaborate with Didi Chuxing to advance research, development and deployment of new transportation technologies and cutting-edge innovations. The nearly USD1M, 3-year joint research program focuses on transportation optimization, big data, artificial language learning and artificial intelligence. (CN Beta, Green Car Congress, Michigan University)
