Reports are trickling down that Samsung has made a deal with QUALCOMM that prevents any other smartphone manufacturer from using the snapdragon 820 till April next year. Qualcomm seems to be happy with this pact as it knows that Samsung flagships phone like the galaxy s6 and note 5 are the only phone that sell in volumes that can compete with the iPhone.
Giving the exclusive access to the Samsung is QUALCOMM’s way of making up for the disaster last year where the snapdragon 810 overheated making it unsuitable for use in the smartphones. Samsung used it home grown exynos 7420 as its replacement and still retained the crown as the most powerful android phone when the flagships launched.
Originally, xaomi’s mi 5 was supposed to come with the snapdragon 820 but the retail listing showed another story. Insiders pointed out that Samsung might be the culprit and the pact with QUALCOMM will not let even LG and Sony use the Soc till April. Typically, the LG flagship launches in the month of May and that might not be a problem for LG but Sony might face some troubles and may have to move the launch window of the z6 by a couple of month due to the QUALCOMM pact.
This gives Samsung ample time to become the top smartphone in the technology world. The iPhone would become 6 months old and the initial crazy would have died down by the time of launch of the Samsung’s next flagship. No other android phone would be available to cannibalize the sales of the galaxy s7 due to the exclusivity pact with QUALCOMM. All this conditions would force the consumer in the first quarter to buy the galaxy s7 if they want a cutting edge phone with state of the art processor.
Samsung is going all out to make the galaxy s7 a super hit phone and QUALCOMM is most happy to help.