Articles about Qualcomm

Qualcomm on Tuesday announced that it will become a minority shareholder in Japanese consumer electronics company Sharp via Qualcomm subsidiarly Pixtronix. The investment focuses on display technology and follows Qualcomm's long-running interest in new mobile display technology with a small energy footprint.

For the last three years, Qualcomm has shown off an impressive MEMS-based full-color e-reader screen called Mirasol which went into commercial production this year and now appears in e-readers from Hanvon, Bambook, and Kyobo.

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Two days ago, Paul Otellini resigned his position as CEO of Intel. Analysts and pundits weigh-in on the matter, generally attributing Otellini’s failure to Intel’s late and flawed effort to gain traction in the mobile processor space. While I tend to agree with this assessment, it doesn’t go far enough to explain Otellini’s fall, which is not only his fault but also the fault of Intel’s board of directors. Yes, Otellini was forced out by the board, but the better action would have been for the board to have fired itself, too.

If there was a single event that triggered this end to Otellini’s tenure at Intel I’m guessing it is Apple’s decision to abandon Intel chips for its desktop computers. There has been no such announcement but Apple has sent signals to the market and the company doesn’t send signals for fun. The question isn’t if Apple will drop Intel but when and the way product design changes are made the when is not this Christmas but next.

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Starting today the HTC DROID DNA is available for purchase at Verizon Wireless. On a two-year contract the J butterfly's US brother runs for $199.99, while off-contract it costs a marginally higher $599.99.

Like the J butterfly, the DROID DNA comes with a massive 5-inch Super LCD3 display with 1920-by-1080 resolution and Corning Gorilla Glass 2 for protection. Power comes from a 1.5GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro processor backed by 2GB of RAM and a relatively small 2020mAh non-removable battery. Unlike the J Butterfly, the big red version has to make due with just 16GB of internal storage as it does not feature a microSD card slot.

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Little more than a month ago Dell introduced the Latitude 10, a Windows 8-based tablet aimed at business users, but withheld the price. Two days ahead of the Windows 8 October 26 launch, the US company slapped a price-tag on its XPS 10 and Latitude 10 tablets.

Unlike the Latitude 10, that runs Windows 8, the Dell XPS 10 is aimed at consumers and will ship with the ARM-compatible Windows RT, similar to Microsoft Surface.

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HTC recently introduced the One X+, a quad-core powerhouse that took the flagship role in the company's smartphone lineup. Today, the Taiwanese phone maker announced the J butterfly (codename "htl21"), a 5-inch device with a whopping 1080p display.

The HTC J butterfly comes with impressive specifications, the first of which is a 5-inch SuperLCD 3 display with a 1920 x 1080 resolution and a density of 440ppi. Power comes from a 1.5GHz quad-core APQ8064 Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor, that is identical to the one found in the LG Optimus G, and 2GB of RAM. On top of the rather modest 16GB of onboard storage, HTC included a microSDHC card slot which is a change of heart from the previously released One S, One X and EVO 4G LTE smartphones that had no expandable storage.

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Yesterday my colleague Joe Wilcox wrote "AT&T starts LG Optimus G preorders Oct. 16, sales Nov. 2," but today Sprint announced that the LG-made quad-core power-house is coming its way, just like the controversial Samsung Galaxy Note II "phablet".

Unlike the AT&T variant the LG Optimus G will come with a 13MP camera, instead of the 8MP shooter announced yesterday, and it will be available for pre-order from November 1, with sales to start on November 11. On a two-year contract the Qualcomm-powered smartphone will cost $199. Also announced is the Samsung Galaxy Note II, that will be available for purchase on October 25 for $299.99 with a two-year contract.

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After Qualcomm spilled the beans, LG officially announced the Optimus G, the world's first quad-core smartphone based on the Snapdragon S4 Pro processor to also include LTE connectivity. The LG Optimus G will be rolled out in September in Korea with global availability to follow after. Look out Samsung Galaxy S III, there is a new flagship smartphone in town...

The LG Optimus G has a 4.7-inch TrueHD IPS display (LCD) that sports an unusual 1280x768 resolution with a 15:9 ratio, packing a fast Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro processor with a quad-core 1.5GHz Krait CPU, Adreno 320 GPU, 2GB of RAM, 32GB of internal storage, a 13 megapixel rear-facing camera with a 1.3 megapixel camera available on the front, 4G LTE connectivity, USB 2.0, Wi-Fi, A-GPS, MHL, DLNA, NFC and Bluetooth 4.0. The device weighs 145 grams and measures 131.9 x 68.9 x 8.45mm. A 2,100mAh battery is powering the LG Optimus G that is running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich.

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The rumors about a new LG quad-core phone are true. Qualcomm confirms the South Korean manufacturer is currently baking an LTE smartphone based on the Snapdragon S4 Pro chipset. We've seen the chipset in the fastest and most expensive Android tablet around, giving LG's smartphone the right credentials for speed.

LG's new quad-core LTE smartphone is anticipated to be released in September, followed by global availability. Because of the Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro chipset it has the makings of a smartphone speed champion, being powered by a quad-core Krait Snapdragon S4 CPU and Adreno 320GPU, a combination that has given Qualcomm's Mobile Development Platform (MDP) the title of fastest Android tablet on the market.

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Thursday, ARM announced the release of its Cortex A9 MPCore Processor Optimization Pack for Globalfoundries 28nm-SLP High-K Metal Gate process technology. This will let System-on-Chip designers optimize performance for Cortex A9 and provide typical working performance of up to 2GHz.

This is a significant announcement because Globalfoundries makes chips for many of the leading mobile companies, including Qualcomm's Snapdragon SoC, and most prominently -in terms of market share and promises of 2GHz smartphones in early 2012- Samsung's Exynos.

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