OEMs rally around Qualcomm's Snapdragon 810

The run-up to the arrival of Qualcomm’s high-end, 64-bit Snapdragon 810 has been anything but smooth. Plagued by reports of overheating and performance issues, Qualcomm has rallied various smartphone OEMs to defend and praise its latest mobile processor.

LG, Motorola, OPPO, Sony, Xiaomi and even Microsoft all make appearances in the joint press release, which you can read below, to tout various benefits and expectations for the Snapdragon 810. Although no devices are mentioned by name, with the exception of the already announced LG G Flex 2 and Mi Note Pro, we can probably take this as a sign that all of these companies have at least one device planned which will feature a Qualcomm Snapdragon 810. Along with public endorsements, you will also find a list of consumer, OEM and operator benefits crammed into the release.

“The smartphone experience at the premium tier will be defined by products that don’t compromise on performance, connectivity and entertainment, and Snapdragon 810 will be at the heart of enabling these features,” – Murthy Renduchintala, executive vice president, Qualcomm Technologies

Qualcomm appears desperate to settle nerves with this press release, but still has not addressed the overheating issue directly. As a result, these rumors are unlikely to disappear until products begin to appear on store shelves. Last week, LG also attempted to reassure potential customers that the G Flex 2 and upcoming G4 won’t suffer from SoC overheating issues.

The consensus is that Samsung will be making use of its own Exynos SoC in the Galaxy S6 instead, following unfavourable test results from its own lab time with the 810, and Samsung is noticeably absent from the press release. That being said, many other OEMs haven’t commented on the matter either, so perhaps we shouldn’t read too much into that.

Have the overheating rumors knocked your confidence in Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 810, or do you see this as an unfortunate PR nightmare that has spiralled out of the company’s control?

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Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 Processor Powers Premium Tier Mobile Experiences of 2015

Superior connected mobile computing processor provides a foundation for global smartphone innovation in 2015

SAN DIEGO, Feb. 2, 2015 /PRNewswire/ — Qualcomm Incorporated (NASDAQ: QCOM) today announced that its subsidiary, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. (QTI), has a growing customer design pipeline in excess of 60 premium tier mobile devices based on the Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 810 processor. New devices based on Snapdragon 810 include the LG G Flex2 and the Xiaomi Mi Note Pro, with many more expected in the coming weeks and months.

“The LG Flex2 is designed to represent a new class of innovation at the premium tier with the dynamically curved design, a richer feature set and faster performance than the previous generation,” said Chris Yie, vice president, head of marketing communications at LG Electronics Mobile Communications Company. “With an advanced feature set and stunning multimedia support, the Snapdragon 810 provides us with a tremendous foundation to enable the most advanced mobile experiences for consumers.”

“Xiaomi prides itself on embracing the leading-edge of innovation for premium mobile devices,” said Lei Jun, Founder, chairman and chief executive officer, Xiaomi. “We make every effort to bring the newest and most innovative technology to our enthusiastic customers, drawing on the best in the industry. Our collaboration with Qualcomm Technologies on the Snapdragon 810-powered Mi Note Pro provides us the ability to deliver more performance, features and user capabilities to a mobile device than ever before. This is what our customers want and what Xiaomi will deliver with the Snapdragon 810.”

“Motorola Mobility and Qualcomm have a long history of cooperating to create amazing mobile experiences,” said Rick Osterloh, president, Motorola Mobility. “The Snapdragon 810 processor will enable us to push the boundaries even further so we can continue delighting our customers with devices that give them new choices.”

“Whether it’s long-lasting battery life, watching the latest movies or enjoying music in Hi-Res Audio quality, our customers are increasingly demanding more from their Xperia device to deliver the latest content and entertainment experiences,” said Gen Tsuchikawa, senior vice president and chief strategy officer, Sony Mobile. “We’re excited about the new capabilities of the Snapdragon 810 processor and are looking forward to working with Qualcomm Technologies as we bring new Xperia products to consumers later this year.”

“OPPO is committed to delivering to our users the most delightful electronic experience, that is full of surprises through meticulous designs as well as smart technology,” said Sky Li, vice president of OPPO and managing director of International Mobile Business. “We’re excited to collaborate with Qualcomm Technologies on our Snapdragon 810-based devices to drive new value in the premium tier for our customers in 2015.”

“Microsoft and Qualcomm’s long standing collaboration has allowed the two companies to offer compelling business, imaging, and entertainment experiences with Lumia smartphones running on Windows Phone,” said Juha Kokkonen, general manager for portfolio and product management at Microsoft. “We look forward to continuing this relationship to deliver best in class Lumia smartphones, powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 810 processors, and offer an unprecedented combination of processing power, rich multimedia, high-performance graphics and wireless connectivity for our customers.”

“The smartphone experience at the premium tier will be defined by products that don’t compromise on performance, connectivity and entertainment, and Snapdragon 810 will be at the heart of enabling these features,” said Murthy Renduchintala, executive vice president, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc., and co-president, QCT. “With a growing design pipeline currently in excess of 60 devices, we’re excited about the innovation our OEM customers will unlock for consumers who demand superior mobile experiences in 2015.”

For premium mobile experiences, Snapdragon 810 processors are designed to enable a new class of performance, connectivity and entertainment never before seen in the premium smartphone tier, including support of the following capabilities for consumers, OEM device makers and operators:

Consumer Capabilities:

• Fast LTE connectivity: based on a next generation integrated LTE Advanced modem with Cat 9 support for speeds of up to 450 Mbps
• Enhanced image quality and clarity: with high-performance dual 14-bit ISP that supports up to 55 megapixel camera capabilities
• Connecting to LTE: enabled by Qualcomm RF360™ Front End Solution Antenna Tuner which increases coverage, throughput and reduces dropped calls
• Console quality gaming in up to 4K resolution: based on the new Qualcomm® Adreno™ 430 GPU with 30 percent more performance and 20 percent lower power than previous generation
• High-performance 64-bit processing: with quad core ARM A57 CPUs running up to 2.0Ghz and quad-core ARM A53s running up to 1.5Ghz
• Fast available Wi-Fi: supporting the new Qualcomm® VIVE™ dual-band, 2×2 802.11ac Wi-Fi with Qualcomm® MU | EFX (MU-MIMO) technology and the newest 60 GHz 802.11ad Wi-Fi for proximal connections up to 5 Gbps
• Comprehensive 4K support: including 4K video recording with playback on device and to external display, utilizing leading color enhancement and power-saving technologies
• Professional quality audio: with support for the latest Dolby Atmos, and up to 24-bit/192kHz music playback using our Qualcomm® Hexagon™ V56 DSP
• Comprehensive LTE coverage: Broad support of LTE/3G modes and bands that support LTE speeds when roaming and fall back to 3G when LTE is not available

OEM benefits

• Single SKU design: Global multimode capability and Qualcomm RF360 front end supports lower OEM development costs, SKU and inventory management complexity and costs for global OEM products
• LTE reliability: tested extensively across major infrastructure and operator networks worldwide
• LTE power efficiency: supported by the maturity of our latest generation LTE Advanced modem and RF360 Envelope Tracker
• 4K multimedia: reliable third generation 4K platform with network and energy efficient HEVC encoding and new Adreno 430 GPU
• Support of all major global position location constellations: including GPS (USA), Glonass (Russia), Beidou (China), and Galileo (EU) LTE DSDA Multi-Sim: supports integrated, single baseband LTE Dual-SIM / dual Active functionality

Operator benefits

• Superior user experience at the cell edge: 3x Carrier Aggregation (3x CA) designed to deliver better consumer experiences throughout a carrier’s network
• Broad use of operators’ spectrum assets: support for major cellular modes, including LTE-FDD and LTE-TDD and all 3GPP-approved CA combinations to support an improved combination of coverage and capacity benefits
• Support for new carrier features anticipated in 2015: including LTE-Broadcast, VoLTE and Video Telephony with seamless Wi-Fi handover.
• Wi-Fi for offload of cellular network traffic: Quality handover of voice and data services between LTE and 802.11ac with MU-MIMO

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