Qualcomm clearly knows how to cater to Chinese handset makers and consumers.
The American tech giant has just unveiled its Snapdragon 888 flagship platform processor, which offers a fully integrated 5G modem and will support the next generation of flagship smartphones.
The 888 sounds like Fafafa (fortune, fortune, fortune) in Chinese, which means wealth and prosperity in Chinese culture, so it should be very popular with Chinese handset makers and consumers.
At the Snapdragon Technology Summit 2020, Qualcomm announced that Android smartphone OEMs including Asus, Black Shark, Lenovo, LG, Phantom, Motorola, Nubia, realme, OnePlus, OPPO, Sharp, Vivo, Xiaomi, and ZTE are all working on Snapdragon 888-based smartphones.
Qualcomm unveils Snapdragon 888 5G flagship processor with X60 baseband integration
Xiaomi Lei Jun said, "The new flagship Mi 11 will be one of the first devices released with the Snapdragon 888 mobile platform, which will be a cutting-edge product full of many hardcore technologies."
Qiang Wu, Vice President and President of Worldwide Sales at OPPO, said, "We are extremely excited that OPPO will launch the first Snapdragon 888-powered flagship smartphones in the first quarter of 2021. We are confident that the next generation of the Find X series will bring an unparalleled new experience to users around the world."
Paisan Hu, Executive Vice President and COO of Vivo, said, "The Vivo brand and the iQOO brand will soon be launching handsets powered by the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 5G mobile platform."
With the new Snapdragon 888, Vivo's and iQOO's flagship products will also offer consumers better imaging and photography capabilities, a more powerful gaming experience, as well as high-speed and convenient 5G connectivity and more smart features, he said.
Bingzhong Lee, founder and CEO of realme, said, "realme will be the first to launch its flagship 5G products with Qualcomm's Snapdragon 888 mobile platform."
With its powerful performance and top-of-the-line 5G capabilities, the Snapdragon 888 is a powerful engine for new flagships and provides more room for imagination in product development, he said.
Black Shark co-founder and CEO Luo Yuzhou said, "Black Shark will launch the first new products powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 888 5G mobile platform in the first quarter of 2021."
Luo Wei, vice president of ZTE, said, "In 2021, ZTE will once again partner with Qualcomm Technologies to release a new generation of flagship products powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 888 5G mobile platform to witness the culmination of a collision of technology and aesthetics and to deliver a groundbreaking product experience to our customers."
With the powerful performance of the Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 mobile platform, combined with Nubia's unique thermal architecture, Nubia and Red Devil's new devices in 2021 will continue to be the performance kings our customers love, giving our customers an even more extreme performance experience," said Yu Hang, senior vice president of Nubia Technologies, Inc. "
The upcoming ROG gaming handset will be powered by the Snapdragon 888, which will be an important milestone in our strong partnership with Qualcomm Technologies," said Bryan Chang, general manager of ASUS' mobile business unit.
The Snapdragon 888 features 1 x 2.84GHz (ARM's latest Cortex X1 core) + 3 x 2.4GHz (Cortex A78) + 4 x 1.8GHz (Cortex A55), Adreno 660 GPU, X60 5G modem baseband, support for WiFi 6E, Bluetooth 5.2.
The Snapdragon 888 will be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon X60 modem, which uses a 5nm process for better power efficiency and improved 5G carrier aggregation across the mmWave and sub-6GHz frequency spectrum.
The Snapdragon 888 features a sixth-generation AI engine (running on a "redesigned" Qualcomm Hexagon processor) and a second-generation sensing hub with 26 TOPS.
On the gaming front, Qualcomm will launch a third-generation Snapdragon Elite Gaming with support for 144fps gaming and desktop-grade rendering.