IF / News

Chipsets

MediaTek board has agreed to spin out Bluetooth related Internt of Thing (IoT) business to 100%-owned company Airoha. The main aim is to reorganize internal resource, to speed up the IoT market development. (China Times, RFID World, Laoyaoba)

Qualcomm has recently approached GaAs IC foundry Win Semiconductors to cooperate in an infrastructure project for 5G mobile networks, according to Digitimes. Smartphone-use power amplifiers remain Win Semi’s major target application.  (Digitimes, press, Android Headlines, EE World)

Worldwide semiconductor capital spending is projected to increase 10.2%  in 2017, to USD77.7B, according to Gartner. This growth rate is up from the previous quarter’s forecast of 1.4%, due to continued aggressive investment in memory and leading-edge logic which is driving spending in wafer-level equipment. (Laoyaoba, Gartner, press)

According to SEMI, total silicon wafer area shipments were 2,978M square inches during 2Q17, a 4.2% increase from the 2,858M square inches shipped during 1Q17. New quarterly total area shipments are 10.1% higher than 2Q16 shipments and are at their highest recorded quarterly level. (SEMI, SEMI, press, STCN)

Touch Display

Other than dual-camera, full display is another topic that has been hyped. Here a series of components supply chain and development will be affected by the full display. (My Drivers, Huxiu, article)

Battery

Terra E Holding GmbH will choose 1 of 5 candidate sites in Germany or a neighboring country next month to build its 34 gigawatt-hour battery factory, indicated by CEO Holger Gritzka. He has helped to assemble a consortium of 17 German companies and won government support for the project, which will break ground in 4Q19 and reach full capacity in 2028. (CN Beta, Bloomberg, Elektra)

A start-up company Ionic Materials has developed prototypes of a rechargeable alkaline battery that can be made using continuous manufacturing processes similar to the making of plastic wrap. The company has demonstrated up to 400 recharge cycles for its prototypes. The executives believe they will be able to triple that. (Laoyaoba, NY Times, Hot Hardware)

Smartphones

According to IDC, a total of 341.6M smartphones worldwide are shipped in 2Q17. Coming off a higher than expected 1Q17, smartphone shipments declined 1.3% from the same quarter a year ago and were down 0.8% from 1Q17. Samsung remained the leader in the worldwide smartphone market grabbing an impressive 23.3% share and 1.4% growth. Xiaomi moved back into the top 5 worldwide with year-over-year growth of 58.9%. (CN Beta, IDC, press)

According to IHS Markit, global smartphone market grew by 7% year-over-year, to 350.9M units in 2Q17, from 320M units in 2Q16. Leaders of the pack Samsung, Apple, Huawei, OPPO and vivo all grew, while Xiaomi reversed its recent performance and just missed out on a top 5 spot. (IHS Markit, press)

According IHS Markit, in 1H17 with China smartphone shipment focusing on vendors Huawei, OPPO, vivo and Xiaomi, the gap between top 10 ODM is getting bigger. Top 4 ODMs Wingtech, Huaqin, Longcheer and Wind, thanks to Huawei, Xiaomi, Lenovo and Meizu, are having apparent leverage. (Laoyaoba, Sohu, ESM China)

Global smartphone shipment slows down, yet the components battle are getting heat up. In 1H17, memory, display, PA, and other components are selling hot even in off-peak season. Following 2H17, which is a smartphone peak season, components costs are going up, which will bring a lot of opportunities to the supply chain. (KK News, Sohu, Laoyaoba)

Apple’s CEO Tim Cook has announced that Apple has now sold over 1.2B cumulative iPhones since the device was first introduced in 2007. BMO Capital Markets analyst Tim Long estimates that there were 715M iPhones currently in use around the world, 228M of which were 2nd-hand devices.  (Laoyaoba, Mac Rumors, Forbes, 9t05Mac, Barron’s, Fortune, SlashGear)

Sony Mobile Communications expects its smartphone shipments to reach 16.5M units in fiscal 2017 (Apr 2017-Mar 2018), up from 14.6M shipped in the previous fiscal year. Smartphone shipments totaled 3.4M units during the Apr-Jun period (F1Q17), up from 3.1M units shipped a year earlier period. (Digitimes, press, CNMO, Laoyaoba)

The shipments of Samsung Galaxy S8 have surpassed the 20M mark in Jul 2017, according to Strategy Analytics. The data showed that Samsung shipped 278,800 units of the smartphone model per day since the official release on 21 Apr 2017, amounting to 19.8M in the Apr-Jun 2017 period. (CN Beta, Laoyaoba, The Investor, BGR)

According to Counterpoint Research, LTE installed base of handsets in India crossed 150M units only behind China and USA now and is estimated to surpass the USA in next 1 year. Smartphone shipments in India grew by modest 4% YoY in 2Q17. Like China, the top 5 brands contributed to almost 70% of the total smartphone market. (Counterpoint Research, press, Laoyaoba)

Samsung reveals Leader 8, a high-end flip phone – 2×4.2” FHD Super AMOLED display, Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 processor, 12MP + 5MP cameras, 4GB RAM, 64GB storage, wireless charging, 2300mAh battery. (Android Authority, Samsung, Sam Mobile)

PCs / Tablets

The downward spiral of the tablet market continued during 2Q17, according to IDC. Despite notable product launches like the new lower priced iPad and products from other top-tier vendors, worldwide shipments for tablets declined 3.4% year over year in 2Q17, reaching 37.9M. (IDC, press, Laoyaoba)

Wearables

Apple’s work on Bluetooth Low Energy Audio, a new technology that streams digital sound directly to hearing air implants, enables people with hearing impairments to communicate and use their iPhone as microphone via iOS 10’s Live Listen feature.  (Apple Insider, Expreview, Wired, TechNews, 9to5Mac)

Fitbit chief executive James Park said that Fitbit’s new smartwatch will have health and fitness tracking features, will have GPS, will be be water resistant up to 50m, and will offer cross-platform compatibility as well as “multi-day battery life.” (CN Beta, The Verge)

According to Strategy Analytics, global wearables shipments reached 22M units in 2Q17. Xiaomi captured 17% market share and became the world’s largest wearables vendor for the first time ever, overtaking Fitbit and Apple. (Phone Arena, Strategy Analytics, press, 199IT)

Internet of Things

According to Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk, there have been 518,000 gross reservations for Model 3 and then we have 455,000 net reservations for Model 3. Tesla says it aims to produce 20,000 Model 3 cars per month starting in Dec 2017. (CN Beta, Business Insider, Electrek)