Apple is currently working on a 5G modem of its own in the bid to ditch Qualcomm, a Bloomberg report stated.
Though it’s not necessarily some new development around the rumors that we have been hearing and Apple buying the modem business of Intel, this report from Bloomberg is still something to pay attention to.
According to the report, Johny Srouji, the senior vice president of hardware technologies at Apple, confirmed in a recent meeting that a model is currently under works as they look forward to another transition.
“This year, we kicked off the development of our first internal cellular modem which will enable another key strategic transition,” he said. “Long-term strategic investments like these are a critical part of enabling our products and making sure we have a rich pipeline of innovative technologies for our future.”
Srouji went further on to mention the $1 billion spend of Apple for buying the Intel’s business which they are quoting as part of their plan to switch away from Qualcomm. Now, that’s something which Apple hasn’t specifically said in the past but everyone could observe it clearly.
“Srouji did not say when the cellular modem would be ready to ship in products, but a 2019 patent agreement between Apple and Qualcomm includes a six-year licensing pact. Qualcomm charges license fees to phone makers based on wireless patents it owns, regardless of whether they use its chips or not.”
The Cupertino-based smartphone manufacturer is already in the transition as it is making a switch from Intel processors and plans to use its own production silicon. They have already started seeing the benefits of this move, as the new M1-powered machines have already started to outpace AMD and Intel by quite a margin. Just imagine what you can expect from a 5G model designed by Apple.