Upcoming flagship smartphones will have to differentiate with advanced functionality such as Wi-Fi 6 and ultrawideband to continue to stand out at the high end of the market as 5G adoption becomes more mainstream, said ABI Research's David McQueen Tuesday. Other features expected to set flagship phones apart are fast-charging technology, foldable and rollable displays, and improved cameras. 5G handsets were largely immune from supply chain disruptions during the pandemic, leading to a more diverse device landscape with a wide variety of prices, the analyst said: “The mobile market is quickly transitioning to 5G and many leading OEMs are pushing ever-deeper into the lower-priced 5G smartphone segment.” ABI forecasts 681 million 5G handsets will ship in 2022. The researcher expects 5G integration and always-on connectivity to appear in tablets, Chromebooks and laptop PCs “as the portable computing and mobile value chains converge more than ever.” COVID-19 boosted demand for mobile computing products, and 5G will become a more prominent feature in high-end products from Samsung, Apple, and Huawei. “Dozens” of always-on 5G portable devices, including tablets and notebook PCs, will hit the market this year, exceeding 10 million next year, said ABI.

Incoming CEO Cristiano Amon rejects the notion Qualcomm is “more acutely impacted” by the chip shortage than others in the space, he told JPMorgan’s virtual conference Wednesday. Spiking demand from many end-market sectors is so pervasive that few, if any, chipmakers are able to keep up, he said: “In the current environment, if you're a semiconductor company and you don't have more demand than supply, you should be worried.” Qualcomm is navigating the crisis through “capacity-planning actions with our foundries, and we expect to see material improvements towards the end of the year,” he said. The company is a firm believer that 5G will require millimeter wave to reach its “full potential,” said Amon. Every global 5G market “eventually” will have mmWave, he said. “It's just a question of time.”

Global smartphone shipments are expected to reach 1.38 billion handsets this year, rising 7.7% over 2020, reported IDC Wednesday. That trajectory is expected to continue into 2022, with 3.8% growth to 1.43 billion. “Markets worldwide continue to migrate toward 5G,” said IDC. “Within emerging markets, there is strong demand for mid-range and low-end 4G phones following last year's pandemic slowdown.” It projects a 3.7% compound annual growth rate in smartphone shipments through 2025. The chip shortage remains a concern for smartphone OEMs, but the impact has been far less than in other markets, said IDC. “Smartphones are seeing competition for consumer spending from adjacent markets like PCs, tablets, TVs and smart home devices, yet that hasn't slowed the market's path to recovery,” said analyst Ryan Reith. A strong “supply-side push” toward 5G continues, and prices of such handsets are dropping, said Reith. IDC expects average selling prices for 5G Android devices to drop 12% in 2021 to $456 and then below $400 in 2022: “With 5G shipments expected to grow nearly 130% in 2021, almost all regions outside of China will see triple-digit growth.”

Valens Semiconductor, originator of HDBaseT high-speed connectivity technology for home theater and autonomous vehicles (see 1704140047), will combine with PTK, a “special purpose acquisition company,” and take itself public on the New York Stock Exchange, said the chipmaker Tuesday. Valens will use the proceeds from the initial public offering to speed development and commercialization of “next generation products and to fully fund the company through profitability,” it said. The stock will trade as VLN once its IPO is complete, it said. The merger transaction is expected to close in the fall and requires regulatory approvals, plus Valens and PTK shareholders' ratifications, said a spokesperson.

The semiconductor industry typically goes through “cycles” of supply and demand imbalance, “but this one is different,” Advanced Micro Devices CEO Lisa Su told a J.P. Morgan virtual conference Monday. “The difference is you see every segment of the market having high demand.” Demand is “very, very high, and higher perhaps than any of us might have expected when we started the year,” she said. “The supply chain has actually been very, very focused on adding more capability. We saw sort of the beginnings of this late last year. We’ve been working very, very closely with our supply chain partners to continue to ramp up supply, adding additional capacity, doing all kinds of productivity improvements.” Su expects more capacity will come online “as we go through the next couple of quarters,” she said. “This will continue to be a key area of focus for the entire supply chain.” Amid the industry’s realization that demand is exceeding supply, “we have done a good job at prioritizing” existing capacity, said Su, “ensuring that we are giving our customers what they need to advance their product lines.” AMD deliberately is leaving some segments of the PC business “underserviced,” especially the “lower end of the PC market,” she said. “We have prioritized some of the higher-end commercial SKUs and gaming SKUs and those kinds of things.” With inventories so “very lean” throughout the semiconductor supply chain, no one is “ordering stuff to put it on the shelves,” but immediately dispatching product that “end customers want,” she said. Supply chain cooperation “is really unprecedented,” said Su.

UL's labs in Basingstoke, U.K., and Stuttgart, Germany, are the first sites in Europe to “address the immediate demand for Wi-Fi 6E wireless testing and certification services,” said the company Friday: “The facilities offer start-ups, scaling businesses and large corporations state-of-the art technology and a comprehensive service solution, including certifications to meet market regulatory requirements around the world, for the smooth introduction of Wi-Fi 6E-enabled products.”

Best Buy Health's new smartphone is geared to older adults. One-touch access to its health and safety services include urgent care telehealth, said the company Thursday.

The global slim modem market for smartphones and tablets grew 72% to $5.8 billion last year, led by Qualcomm with 56% share, said Strategy Analytics Wednesday. Qualcomm’s shipments grew 377% with the X55 5G slim modem in the iPhone 12 series and multiple Android devices. Intel shipments declined 23% on Apple’s shift to Qualcomm; the iPhone 11 series and SE 2020 drove Intel's shipments in the category. SA expects slim modem vendors, also including MediaTek and Samsung, to target more applications in cellular IoT, automotive, connected PCs, fixed wireless access and mobile broadband segments in the next few quarters.

Walmart U.S. e-commerce sales grew 37% in the quarter ended April 30 from the year-ago period, more than doubling over two years. At Sam’s Club, it gained 47% on curbside pickup, said Chief Financial Officer Brett Biggs. Walmart is focused on serving customers better by “diversifying the model,” said CEO Doug McMillon on a quarterly call Tuesday. He cited investments in pickup and delivery, Walmart+ memberships and other factors. Consumer electronics is one of the “pockets where we continue to chase demand,” said CEO Doug McMillon. “We’re monitoring things like delays into ports and other factors in the supply chain.”

Vizio didn’t take itself public for customary reasons of raising money, but to get the “story” out about plans to “get to the next level” in streaming, Chief Financial Officer Adam Townsend told a Needham virtual conference Monday. There's “a nice balance sheet, ample cash, no debt, cash-flow-positive,” he said. It spent the past several years “really investing in a software platform to bring a proprietary operating system to the market” to exploit “the future of consumer video consumption,” he said of SmartCast OS. The streaming opportunity is “getting well defined, and really, really large,” he said. Vizio is “now at scale” with 13.5 million monthly active SmartCast users, he said. “We’re really expanding the offering to consumers in total.” Vizio will add “a lot more” content later this year, he said: “Some pretty big household brand names are coming to the platform pretty soon.”