Chip Costs Soar: Smartphones Face Upgrade Slowdown, Analyst Says
This year, with the launch of the third-generation Snapdragon 8 mobile platform, support for artificial intelligence features has become a new development direction for smartphones. However, Mizuho Securities and other industry analysts have recently predicted that due to the current limited practical value of AI features, which fail to significantly engage users, and the ongoing rise in semiconductor prices, Samsung and Apple are likely to deem it unnecessary to integrate larger memory capacities in their upcoming Galaxy S24 and iPhone 16 models, suggesting that these devices may not see significant upgrades in memory capacity.
According to a report from wccftech, Mizuho Securities’ latest analysis indicates that the cost of smartphone chips is continually rising. The third-generation Snapdragon 8 mobile platform is reportedly more expensive than its predecessor, and next year’s fourth-generation Snapdragon 8 mobile platform, to be manufactured using TSMC’s “N3E” process, is expected to incur even higher costs. Rumors suggest that this fourth-generation platform could be Qualcomm’s most expensive SoC to date. Consequently, Mizuho Securities forecasts that smartphone manufacturers like Samsung and Apple will adopt a more conservative approach regarding upgrades in new models, especially in terms of memory capacity, potentially lagging behind other brands.
Revegnus, responding to Mizuho Securities’ predictions on the X platform, opines that the lack of user engagement with AI-generated content, coupled with rising semiconductor prices, are reasons why Samsung and Apple might not see the need to upgrade memory configurations in the Galaxy S24 and iPhone 16.
Regarding the iPhone 16, rumors are circulating that Apple plans to upgrade its microphone configuration to enhance the user experience with Siri and other AI-related features. Moreover, Samsung is reportedly developing a new UFS 4.0 flash memory to support AI functions, although it remains unconfirmed whether this will be implemented in the Galaxy S24 series.
