News Briefing 

        

According to the forecast report on 5G mobile-phone application processors around the world released by Counterpoint, a market research agency, in early May, the market share of shipments by MediaTek will grow from 15% in 2020 to 28% in 2021, much closer to the 30% currently held by Qualcomm. 

 

Impact analysis 

        

For a long time, whenever new communication technology is introduced to the market, MediaTek application processors have always emerged as a challenger, eroding Qualcomm’s market share as the market matures. However, the rise of Hisilicon in the 4G market has rendered MediaTek most vulnerable in all aspects, yet should recover most of the lost market swept up by Hisilicon in 2021, according to the released forecast report. As such, it will not make MediaTek equal to its rival, Qualcomm, in the 5G generation much earlier than expected, but will widen the gap with Qualcomm in the overall smartphone market.

 

        

Apple, MediaTek, or Qualcomm, are all important customers of substrate manufacturers in Taiwan, so the fluctuations in market share should, theoretically, exert little impact on the overall substrate performance in the short term. But the emergence of MediaTek has strengthened the global influence of IC design in Taiwan, making their semi-conductors develop into another field of advantage besides wafer foundry. In the long term, it should help IC substrates, classified as a part of the semi-conductor supply chain, illustrate the advantage of the industrial cluster even more.