Apple's quest for modem independence from Qualcomm is going nowhere fast | Hacker News Reader

Apple's quest for modem independence from Qualcomm is going nowhere fast

theregister.com

19 pointsalexahn10 comments

I have this gut feeling Apple will buy Qualcomm in the near future. I hear stories in different forums that Qualcomm seems to have some layoffs and churn lately and so I think this might be a sign of them floundering. Yeah they still have a large share of the market, but Apple has the money and it would probably be seen as a win for both companies.

Have to imagine that would be blocked by regulators given how big a chunk of the cellphone market Qualcomm services, no? I know they’re struggling on the SoC side but I thought they remained dominant as the modem manufacturer for most of the chips.

Also, I suspect the constant licensing disputes are part of the reason but the other is that Apple thinks they can build one that outperforms Qualcomm the same way their CPUs outmatch other providers. I suspect they also have ambitions for Satellite-based telephony to cut out cell providers & provide Apple-branded cellular service directly to their customers (+ maybe even be more battery efficient because the design only needs to suit Apple’s needs and not also the combined needs of all providers). As such, acquiring QCOM seems unnecessary and expensive and the only reason is if Apple thinks they are unlikely to win a patent war (QCOM is very litigious and also happens to own a lot of foundational patents that make their way into cellular standards). I think Apple is more likely to risk a patent war with QCOM then try to avoid that with a massive acquisition that would likely get blocked, cause all sorts of political problems for them, and even if it went through would pose a massive cultural problem for them to absorb (I’ve seen such major acquisitions first hand and I can’t think of a successful one when it’s this size and complexity).

Yes, because regulators have an extensive history of not allowing massive mergers, to the detriment of the consumer. lol

This would never get past regulators approval. Qualcomm has a massive share of the Android CPU market, putting the combined entity in a clear monopoly situation.

Companies the size of Apple are very limited in acquiring other large companies (see: Nvidia trying to buy ARM or Microsoft struggling to close on Activision)

Apple only spend at max $10B a year to Qualcomm. Even if you ignore any R&D related to the 5G modem Apple would still need around $4B to Fab those chips. At a cost saving of maximum $6B per year.

Qualcomm has a market cap of $150B, potential take over would be at least 20% premium at $180B, along with regulation hurdle.

The largest Apple takeover to date, Beats at $3B. Roughly $4B today when adjusted for inflation.

I doubt Apple would be allowed to. It would give them too much power over their competitors which are dependent on Qualcomm.

Or it simply means it’s not a priority right now.

Most of the complexity in a modern modem chip is for compatibility with legacy networks. if Apple decided to make a chip which would be launched in one country only and only work on 4G or 5G then I think they could do that within a year

Most people suggesting that has either not ever read the 3GPP Real 18 Spec or ever done anything with RF engineering.

Apple is big enough they could cut out huge swathes of the spec and just tell carriers to cope with it if they want iphones on their network.

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