Fixed Mobile Convergence

Strategy Analytics, a global independent research and consulting firm, has recently published the results of its latest research “Baseband Market Share Tracker: Broadcom and Spreadtrum’s Growth Surged in 2010.” According to the report, Strategy Analytics stated that the global cellular baseband revenue had shown a significant year-over-year growth of 20 percent and had reached $13.2 billion in 2010. The vendor market share statistics for the report were recorded from the Handset Component Technologies and RF and Wireless Components market research services of Strategy Analytics. The report showed that vendors Qualcomm, Broadcom and Spreadtrum have shown the maximum growth.

In a release, Stuart Robinson, director of the strategy analytics handset component technologies service said that, “Through its acquisition of Infineon, Intel (News - Alert) ranked fourth in the overall baseband market behind Qualcomm, MediaTek and Texas Instruments in 2010. Infineon has built very strong momentum through 2010. In the all-important UMTS / W-CDMA sector, Intel is now already ranked third. We believe that Intel’s immediate task is to maintain this momentum by ramping up its HSPA+ platform XMM6260 in the handset and non-handset markets. Strategy Analytics estimates that LTE (News - Alert) baseband shipments accounted for less than one-tenth of 1 percent of total baseband shipments in 2010 and was dominated by single-mode OEM-branded solutions. Strategy Analytics believes that in the long-term, the LTE baseband market will be dominated by multi-mode solutions from merchant baseband vendors such as Qualcomm, ST-Ericsson, Icera (News - Alert), Intel, Renesas, Broadcom and Altair Semiconductor.”

Strategy Analytics, a leading provider of market intelligence, has published a report on the significant growth of the Cellular Baseband market by analysing the shipments and revenues of top companies such as Broadcom, Spreadtrum, MediaTek, MStar Semiconductor, ST-Ericsson, and Qualcomm. Broadcom and Spreadtrum had registered triple-digit growth in terms of unit shipments and revenues in 2010, due to Broadcom’s contracts with Nokia and Samsung (News - Alert) in the second half of 2010 and Spreadtrum due to its international expansion.

MediaTek struggled to increase its revenue share in spite of shipping the most number of cellular baseband unit shipments in 2010, owing to the intense price pressure from MStar Semiconductor and Spreadtrum especially in the second half of 2010. ST-Ericsson, on the other hand, is in a better position to improve its market share in the second half of 2011 with its upcoming W-CDMA design-wins at tier-one handset manufacturers. In terms of revenue Qualcomm has led the overall cellular baseband market with a 40 percent share in 2010, due to its strong dominant market position in the CDMA and W-CDMA baseband markets.

Sravan Kundojjala, senior analyst said that, “Spreadtrum’s cellular baseband unit shipment growth surged in 2010. Strategy Analytics estimates that Spreadtrum shipped more basebands than Broadcom, Marvell (News - Alert) and ST-Ericsson in the second half of 2010. We estimate that MediaTek and Spreadtrum together accounted for 45 percent of total GSM/GPRS/EDGE baseband shipments in 2010.”