Over the past few years, Qualcomm has shifted away from Samsung Foundry for the fabrication of its high-end Snapdragon chips. However, the company is keen on collaborating with Samsung Foundry again for future chips, such as the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5, which will likely be released in 2025.
Qualcomm CEO keen on using Samsung Foundry for future Snapdragon chips
According to a Business Korea report, Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon is seriously considering working with Samsung Foundry for chip manufacturing. At a media briefing held at the W Hotel in Taipei, Taiwan, Amon said he is considering the dual-sourcing method for future flagship Snapdragon chips. This event was held on June 4, 2024.
Dual-sourcing refers to simultaneously getting the products (or manufacturing) from two sources. In this case, Qualcomm refers to using the semiconductor chip manufacturing services of both Samsung Foundry and TSMC.
Amon reportedly said, “The current focus must be on the foundry production at TSMC, but it will likely require significant effort to have one company handle both aspects.” He seems interested in working with both TSMC and Samsung Electronics and supports the dual-sourcing approach.
Watch our performance comparison of Exynos 2400 and Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 in the video below. The Exynos 2400 uses Samsung Foundry's 4nm process, while the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 uses TSMC's 4nm process node.
Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 could use Samsung Foundry's 2nm process
The Snapdragon 888 was made using Samsung Foundry's 5nm process, while the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 was made using Samsung's 4nm process. Both chips had overheating and power-efficiency issues. Hence, Qualcomm switched to TSMC's 4nm processes for the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1, Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, and Snapdragon 8 Gen 3.
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 4, which features Qualcomm's custom Oryon CPU cores, is expected to use TSMC's 3nm process. Earlier, Qualcomm was expected to get some of those chips made by Samsung Foundry's 3nm process. However, that looks unlikely now.
According to some reports, if Samsung Foundry gets a good enough yield (the percentage of all manufactured chips that pass quality testing) for its 2nn process node, it could get orders from Qualcomm for the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5.
