Strategy Analytics: 5G Capabilities Will Drive Cellular Baseband Processor Sales Growth

  • Qualcomm’s strength in 5G will help the company maintain momentum through 2025 as operators and phone OEMs continue the transition away from 3G and 4G.

  • Non-handset cellular will continue to grow at a healthy rate, with M2M modules suppliers continuing to shift quickly to LTE Cat. M and NB-IoT next year.

  • In 2022, 3GPP Rel. 17 will boost the growth of 5G for new machine-type communications applications that do not require high data rates, but instead need the low-latency and high reliability benefits of 5G.

The Strategy Analytics’ research report "Cellular Baseband Forecast 2020 - 2025: 5G ASP Strength to Drive Revenue Growth" finds that Qualcomm, MediaTek, Samsung LSI, Apple, Unisoc, and HiSilicon will ship the most baseband processors for cellular devices through 2025. In revenue terms, new features enabled by advanced transistor technologies such as higher data rates, artificial intelligence and higher performance image processing integrated within the processors will help counter lower ASPs from the growth of mid- and low-tier devices and machine-type communications applications, leading to a predicted 6.5 percent per year growth in the market through 2025.

Sravan Kundojjala, Associate Director and co-author, commented, "Qualcomm’s strength in 5G will help the company maintain momentum through 2025 as operators and phone OEMs continue the transition away from 3G and 4G. Even with an increase in competition in 5G from chipset suppliers MediaTek, Samsung LSI, Unisoc, HiSilicon and specialist IoT chipset suppliers, Qualcomm’s innovations will keep it well-positioned to grow its baseband shipments and revenue through 2025."

According to Christopher Taylor, Director of the Strategy Analytics RF & Wireless Components service and author of the report, added, "Non-handset cellular will continue to grow at a healthy rate, with M2M modules suppliers continuing to shift quickly to LTE Cat. M and NB-IoT next year. In 2022, 3GPP Rel. 17 will boost the growth of 5G for new machine-type communications applications that do not require high data rates, but instead need the low-latency and high reliability benefits of 5G. Processors used in M2M radios have relatively low ASPs, but despite this, the expanding benefits of 5G will help support prices for 5G basebands overall, leading to market growth.”

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Nicholas Cooper5G, cellular, cellular networks, processor, Strategy Analytics