Qualcomm Boosts High-end Chipsets

Qualcomm Inc. ( QCOM - Analyst Report ) , the leading chipset maker for mobile handsets in the world, recently unveiled two new Snapdragon chipsets: Snapdragon 800 and 600 processors, targeting high-end mobile devices.

Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 800 processor, which supports 4G LTE technology mainly caters to premium smartphones category, delivering 2.3 GHz clock speed and better battery back up. It is powered with new quad core Krait 400 CPU, Adreno 330 GPU, Hexagon v5 DSP, hence offering 75% improved performance than its earlier Snapdragon S4 Pro processors.

Snapdragon 800 chipset is also integrated with New IZat location technology, thus allowing users a perfect navigation system. Apart from supporting UltraHD video recordings and display, it also supports third generation 4G LTE modem with 150 Mbps data speed.

While Snapdragon 600 processor is powered with Krait 300 quad-core CPU with a clock speed of 1.9 GHz, thereby offering 40% improved performance than the S4 Pro processor.

Both these processors are distributed as samples but expected to be commercially available from the second half of 2013, Qualcomm has already gained 50 design wins, hence expected to deliver better performance from mid-year onwards.

According to the latest report presented by Gartner on worldwide semiconductor industry, Qualcomm holds third place, with 4.4% market share just behind the market leader Intel Corporation ( INTC - Analyst Report ) and Samsung Electronics. As per the report, except for two chipset manufacturers, Qualcomm and Broadcom Corp. ( BRCM - Analyst Report ) , other semiconductor vendors declared fall in revenue in 2012.

In the last quarter, Qualcomm shipped around 141 million chipsets and expects to ship in between 168 to178 million processors in the next quarter. The company also raised its revenue guidance for full fiscal 2013. So, with the availability of Snapdragon 800 and 600 processors, the company will not only raise its revenue outlook for fiscal 2013 but at the same time will retain its third spot.

We maintain our long-term Neutral recommendation on Qualcomm. Currently, the company has a Zacks #3 Rank, implying a short-term (Hold) rating on the stock.