- Surge S1, Xiaomi’s first proprietary processor, made news in 2017
- There are only a handful of consumer electronics and smartphone brands that can manufacture processors
Xiaomi has reportedly stopped working on its chipset manufacturing plans. The company’s first processor, Surge S1, made news back in 2017. A Gizmo China report also highlighted a possible partnership between Nokia and Xiaomi. The report mentioned Nokia using Surge S1 chip in its smartphone back in 2017.
Some time back, Surge S1 had powered Xiaomi Mi 5c smartphone. Surge S1 was an octa-core processor equipped with four Cortex A53 cores clocked at 2.2GHz and four more clocked at 1.4GHz. GPU, on the other hand, was ARM’s Mali-T860.
Only a handful of brands can manufacture processors
Only a handful of companies have the prowess and ability to manufacture such processors in the world. While Samsung and Huawei are among these, Xiaomi got its first processor developed through Pinecone division. Rumours of Xiaomi introducing Surge S2 had surfaced in 2018 but that never happened. Apple acquired Intel’s smartphone modem business via a transaction valued at $1 billion recently.
The smartphone processor market, as per a report by Research Nester, is anticipated to grow at a significant CAGR over the forecast period i.e. 2020-2027. The market is segmented by technology & by application, out of which, the technology segment is anticipated to occupy the leading market share on account of increasing number of technologically advanced processors entering the market that are being released by a selective number of market players who are focusing on new innovations.
In the second quarter of 2019, Qualcomm accounted for 40 per cent of global smartphone AP market revenues. A Statista report also pointed out that Apple ranked second with a 20 per cent revenue share. The worldwide smartphone AP market volume was valued at 4.8 billion U.S. dollars in that quarter, with a two percent year-over-year decline.
