Intel is a company in the doldrums, the "few" computers, both laptops and desktops that are being sold in recent years have negatively affected its economy, so much so that they have had to lay off a good number of employees in the United States from America. The big problem is that Intel did not know (or did not want) to adapt to the mobile world, meanwhile Qualcomm took the opportunity to sell its chips everywhere. Nevertheless, The latest scuffle between Apple and Qualcomm that we have discussed here on more than one occasion, has nominated Intel as the main candidate to manufacture the LTE chip that the next iPhone will mount.
According to DigiTimes, the current state of negotiations between Qualcomm and Apple has led the Cupertino company to entrust Intel to manufacture more LTE chips that will mount the three models that will presumably be presented during the year 2017, we talk about the iPhone 7s, the iPhone 7s Plus and a special model designed to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the launch of the iPhone and that Apple would put the market from $ 1.000.
Qualcomm currently manufactures 70% of the LTE chips assembled by Apple, while Intel takes only 30% of the manufacturing. However, the change will be gradual, not radical, so this year 50% of the LTE chips will correspond to Qualcomm, and the other part will be taken exactly the same by Intel. This will increase by sections, with Intel going to keep 70% of manufacturing in 2018 and 100% from that year on.
There is no doubt that the royalty war between Apple and Qualcomm has a lot to do with it, and losing an important customer like Apple is not a good thing for any company. However, Qualcomm has shown a position more of attack than of defense before the accusations of the Cupertino company.