Telecom Lead America: Wireless chip major Qualcomm is leading mobile device GPU suppliers market in the first half of 2012.
Qualcomm has 26.7 percent market share.
Samsung is in second position with 22.2 percent market share.
In third position, Apple has 21.1 percent market share in mobile device GPU suppliers market in the first half of 2012, according to Jon Peddie Research (JPR).
Shipments of GPUs in mobile devices (tablets and smart phones) during the first half of 2012 increased 69.4 percent.
Samsung’s sales surged in the first half giving them CAGR of 179 percent, followed by Qualcomm at 39 percent. MediaTek had 966 percent growth year to year, starting from a very low base.
In terms of market share change, Apple held pretty even. Samsung and Others grew as shown in Table 1.
| Change | |
| Apple | 70.0 percent |
| Nvidia | 36.6 percent |
| Qualcomm | 39.0 percent |
| Samsung | 179.4 percent |
| TI | -31.6 percent |
| Others | 493.5 percent |
Table 1: Shipments from 1H’11 to 1H’12 for mobile device GPU suppliers
Other suppliers in the market include Broadcom, Freescale, Intel, Marvell, MediaTek, Rockchip, ST-Ericsson, and WonderMedia.
Figure 1: Market share in the first half of 2012 of Mobile SoCs with 3D GPUs
Modern mobile SoC GPUs are running OpenGL ES 3.0, which was publicly released in August 2012.
In addition to the semiconductor suppliers there are four GPU IP suppliers: ARM, DMP, Imagination Technologies, and Vivante. Those companies provide IP to all of the SoC builders except Nvidia and Qualcomm.
2012 is shaping up to be the year of the tablet as Chinese SoC builders like Rockchip and MediaTek deliver millions of devices for Chinese tablets that are being consumed by Chinese Consumers. The price wars have started as these tablets have dropped below $100.
