Samsung will drop Qualcomm chip from upcoming Galaxy S6 smartphone

Looks like Samsung is going to use its own chips inside future Galaxy S series phones. According to a report in Bloomberg , Samsung has decided to drop the Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 chipset from its future Galaxy S series phone - most likely the S6 - after it turned out that the Snapdragon 810 overheated while undergoing testing.

According to people privy to the matter, the new Galaxy S series phone will come with Samsung’s own advanced chipset. Samsung already had plans to invest $14.7 billion in a chip-making facility outside Seoul. Looks like Samsung wants to be more self-reliant by going with its own chipsets in future flagship smartphones.

The report goes on to state that Samsung Galaxy S6 may come out in March and Samsung does not want to take a risk with a chipset which is causing overheating issues in its testing phases. As a result of this news Qualcomm shares dropped by 1.2 per cent on the New York Stock Exchange, whereas Samsung shares rose by 1.7 per cent in Seoul.

Qualcomm not only makes entire chipsets having CPU cores, graphics cores, RAM and so on, but has also integrated its modems within the package. Samsung Exynos chips on the other hand require an external LTE modem to be added on. In fact, Samsung is the second largest customer of Qualcomm, making up about 12 percent of Qualcomm sales.

Some of the phones which house the Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 chipset includes LG G Flex 2 and the Xiaomi Mi Note Pro.

It is in Samsung’s interests to invest into chip-making thanks to its vast product portfolio. With the Internet of Things and wearables market set to pick up pace in the coming years, reports say it will be worth $7.1 trillion by 2020, it is no surprise that Samsung is investing in chip-making facilities.

With Xiaomi also partnering with 4G chip-making firm in China , there will come a time eventually when Qualcomm will have to let go of Xiaomi as well.

Qualcomm has refused to comment to Bloomberg about this news item. Thankfully, Samsung’s Korean rival LG has dismissed any claims of overheating with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 chipset. Now whethere that is because LG is invested in the 810 with its Flex 2, only time will tell.