Samsung led the dual-core smartphone applications processor market last year with a 60% share, followed by Qualcomm, Texas Instruments and NVIDIA, according to a latest report by Strategy Analytics Handset Component Technologies (HCT) service.
According to the report, "Smartphone Multi-Core Apps Processor Market Share: Samsung Leads with 60 Percent Volume Share in 2011," reveals dual-core processors powered 20% of total smartphone applications processors shipped last year.
Samsung’s lead in dual-core processors has been attributed to its strong sales at Apple and in the company’s own mobile handset division.
According to the report, stand-alone applications processors formed 90% of total dual-cores shipped in 2011.
Considering 72% of total single-core processor chips shipped were integrated with baseband applications processors in 2011, the research firm reveals single-core applications processors are much more likely to be integrated in the future.
Strategy Analytics Handset Component Technologies service director Stuart Robinson said Qualcomm captured 16% volume share in the dual-core smartphone applications processor market in 2011 on the strength of its dual-core Snapdragon applications processor products MSM8x60 and APQ8060.
"Strategy Analytics believes that Qualcomm is well-positioned to make significant share gains in 2012 with the help of its LTE-integrated dual-core Snapdragon processor MSM8960," Robinson added.
Strategy Analytics senior analyst Sravan Kundojjala said "Strategy Analytics would advise NVIDIA to focus on high volume tier-one design-wins in 2012 in order to maintain its first-mover advantage with quad-core processors.
"NVIDIA, whose Tegra 2 smartphone shipments declined 8 percent at the end of 2011–compared to shipments in the first half of the year– lost momentum, despite being early to market with dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 processors," added Sravan.
"Strategy Analytics anticipates dual-core applications processor penetration into mainstream smartphones will accelerate through 2012 and into 2013, and new ARM architectures such as Cortex-A5 will help dual-core penetrate entry-level smartphones at the start of 2013."
