Since the birth of the smartphone industry, processors have always fought in an unending arms race. It’s all about power. In this industry, the fastest processor wins.
Recently, the industry properly established market segmentation. Now, processors have leaders in flagship, midrange, and budget segments. However, the industry was still in the arms race, regardless of segmentation.
Despite this trend, Qualcomm has announced a surprising decision. Instead of pursuing the fastest, the chip maker will instead focus on the bottom of the barrel.
Currently, the Snapdragon 200 series populates the company’s entry-level market. However, fiercer competition has edged out the series in this segment. Right now, MediaTek has captured more entry-level phones than Qualcomm.
With this, Qualcomm is testing a new series outside of the iconic Snapdragon lineup. The Qualcomm QM215 will focus on smartphones within the Android Go program. As such, the new chip will offer incredibly budget-friendly options for consumers.
According to a German source, the planned product is a 1.3GHz quad-core chipset, coupled with a 650MHz GPU. Prototype devices are touting LCD screens (1440 x 720 resolution), up to 2GB of LPDDR3 memory, and up to 16GB of internal storage. According to the same source, a “well-known smartphone maker” is already developing a device with the new chip. Likewise, component makers have already created fingerprint readers tailored for the chip. With its currently rumored specs, the chipset matches performance from the Snapdragon 400 series.
Right now, the product is likely in its early stages. The Qualcomm QM215 might even ultimately add to the Snapdragon 200 series after all. If anything, expect a lot more movement from Qualcomm in the entry-level market in the future.
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