In its first earnings call for 2024, Qualcomm said Apple has extended its contract with Qualcomm’s 5G modem patents until March 2027, according to Mac Rumors. Just one year ago, Apple extended this license until 2026 as it faced some ambitious development challenges. This is an in-house modem. Now, five months later, it appears Apple has decided to add another year to this license agreement, presumably because he faced some more challenges with his 5G modem design.
This claim is backed up by Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon, who said in an interview with CNBC, “We are very happy with our relationship with Apple at this point, and we will continue to provide Apple with modems.” We will continue to provide the same.” Apple has not yet commented on this recent enhancement. Apple may confirm this statement with its own earnings release later today.
In 2023, we reported twice that Apple’s 5G modem project had been delayed until late 2025, then again until 2026, with further delays possible. The company originally planned to introduce the chip to the iPhone SE in spring 2025, but missed the requested deadline. Therefore, Apple decided to exercise its unilateral option to extend Qualcomm’s patent for an additional two years.
Exploring Apple’s internal modem
Apple’s modem project was started by Tim Cook in 2018 to reduce dependence on external suppliers. It will also save money, as the company paid Qualcomm more than $7.2 billion in 2022. Apple has begun hiring engineers for Project Sinope. Unsurprisingly, it faced some challenges, including poor performance and overheating. The chip was also so large that it took up half of the iPhone’s internal space. In September 2023, the company decided to postpone its transition plan by 2025 and enter into a deal with Qualcomm by 2026.
Apple is primarily focused on 6G chips, but has not yet abandoned its initial 5G modem ambitions despite some setbacks. If the products can compete, completely reducing dependence on a single chip manufacturer is a healthy long-term goal. However, this effort looks more like an arms race for cellular modem SoCs, with Qualcomm being the dominant supplier and Apple facing some challenges and complexities enough to delay him by at least a year. .
Even with the best infrastructure and design team, in-house chip manufacturing is extremely complex. Apple isn’t the first company in the smartphone industry to have such ambitious plans. Samsung has been manufacturing its own mobile SoCs since 2010. We recently launched the Galaxy S24 series. His S24 and his S24 Plus use his Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 in models sold in the US and Canada, while in other countries, the Exynos 2400.