MTK's shipments are in jeopardy, while Qualcomm's revenue is still the largest.

According to Shuiqing Muhua's latest research report, MediaTek (MTK) achieved its first place in the world in terms of baseband shipments in 2009, and will continue to be the world's number one in 2010. The hero behind MediaTek's first place is undoubtedly the Shanzhai mobile phone, that is, the white-label (grey brand) mobile phone.

China's white-label mobile phones serve the world. They can quickly change their designs to meet the needs of various markets around the world and are extremely efficient. At the same time, Guangdong's perfect mobile phone industry chain also makes it have unparalleled cost competitiveness. In MediaTek's total shipments, the ratio of white-label to branded is about 6:4, and the growth momentum comes from white-label.

In 2008, MediaTek was recognized by LG and Motorola, but only for low-end products. Samsung, Nokia, Sony Ericsson, RIM and Apple are unlikely to recognize MediaTek. Therefore, MediaTek has reached the ceiling of growth and it is difficult to go further. The success of the 2G era also led to insufficient investment in 3G, or MediaTek did not expect 3G and 3.5G to come so quickly.

In the 3G era, all manufacturers have to face Qualcomm, the biggest competitor. Qualcomm's WCDMA MSM series products were launched as early as 2001. After years of improvement, they are currently the best products. The cheap QSC series has also gone through 5 years of refinement and is currently the best product in terms of cost performance.

MediaTek also does not have an advantage in the field of smartphones. It is extremely difficult to promote MediaTek's smartphone chips because they are bundled with the declining Windows Mobile and do not support 3G. Their performance is far from comparable to mainstream smartphone CPUs. Multimedia performance, 3D graphics generation, floating-point computing capabilities, etc. are not what MediaTek is good at. This requires a long period of accumulation and early layout. Currently, only Qualcomm and Marvell have achieved single-chip smartphone CPUs with modems, and Qualcomm has already started to lay out 10 years ago. Even if MediaTek temporarily switched to Android, it would be too late.

Morningstar, which is trying to replace MediaTek, has emerged. The company entered the mobile phone field in 2006 and acquired relevant capabilities after multiple acquisitions. Currently, four basebands have been launched. The first competitive strategy is low price, and the second is to provide strong support to customers regardless of size. MediaTek is working hard to shift to brand customers and large customers, which naturally leaves market space for Morningstar and Spreadtrum. However, the white-label market is a market with great risks and fluctuations. It is an open secret in the industry that 100% of white-label mobile phones use smuggled electronic components, and the policy risks are huge. It is not what a manufacturer with a long-term vision should do to associate with such high-risk customers, which is one of the reasons why MediaTek is seeking transformation. At the same time, Morningstar's product line is insufficient. MediaTek's success is not only the launch of baseband products, but also other products such as RF transceivers, power management, Bluetooth, touch screens, WLAN, FM radio, USB, etc. MediaTek can provide all of them. Powerful analog, mixed signal, and RF capabilities are what make MediaTek outstanding. It is not difficult to develop a pure digital baseband. Many manufacturers, including Interchip, Skyworks, and Silicon Labs, have launched such products, but later withdrew from this field.

Infineon has been in full bloom in 2010. Some of Nokia's low-end products use it. The cooperation with Apple is also very close. Infineon is the only supplier of baseband for Apple mobile phones. iPhone 4 will benefit Infineon. LG also regards Infineon as its main supplier. Its high-end, mid-end and low-end products use a large number of Infineon products. However, for Infineon, the profit margin of the mobile phone department is much lower than that of other departments, while the funds and resources it possesses are much higher than those of other departments. There have been rumors that Intel intends to acquire Infineon's mobile phone department. Once the acquisition is successful, Intel will return to the mobile phone field. With Intel's strong strength, the competition in the baseband industry will inevitably increase.

Broadcom also had a fruitful year in 2010. Nokia's low-end products used a large number of Broadcom basebands, and domestic customers also used them. In 2009, Broadcom won the lawsuit against Qualcomm and received a huge compensation of nearly US$700 million. Broadcom's shortcoming is that its product line is too long, and its investment in the mobile phone field is dispersed. After years of hard work, it has not achieved much.

Texas Instruments seemed to be disappointed. Mobile phone baseband is no longer its core business, but after all, it has cooperated with Nokia for many years and its shipments are still large. RAPUYAMA also shipped a large number of products in 2010, and Texas Instruments' baseband business can still maintain a revenue of 1.5 billion US dollars. ST-ERICSSON is also declining and has been losing money. The effect of the merger of the three companies is not obvious. There are no products in the field of smartphones. The application processor was originally excellent, but it later withdrew. [page]

In the mid-to-high-end segment, major customers LG and Samsung have increased their purchases from Infineon, especially LG. In the low-end segment, Nokia has increased its reliance on Broadcom and Infineon. TD-SCDMA is its biggest highlight, but it faces challenges from MediaTek.

Marvell's products have first-rate performance, but the price is too high. Fortunately, it has the support of its major customer RIM. Freescale still has business dealings with Nokia and Motorola, and the RAPIDOYAWE jointly developed with Nokia is still Nokia's flagship. Spreadtrum has benefited from MediaTek's transformation and its shipments have increased significantly.

The most stable one is Qualcomm, whose sales are more than twice that of the second-ranked MediaTek. It is the absolute number one in the 3G and 4G fields, and is also extremely strong in the smartphone field.

Global Mobile Phone Baseband Manufacturers Shipments and Revenues in 2009

MediaTek smartphone chip shipments will increase significantly in the second quarter