A Hurdle is Quickly Approaching for the RF Market

Mobile Experts discloses which moves must be made to clear the jump to 5G

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May 03, 2018, 08:30 ET

CAMPBELL, Calif., May 3, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- For the last few decades, RF has evolved in a variety of ways. According to Mobile Experts, the upcoming leap to 5G will require a new level of system level coordination: modems and RF Front Ends will be designed in tandem. Mobile Experts' latest Expert INSIGHT offers robust strategic analysis for these upcoming changes in the RF market, including analysis of how a form of "Artificial Intelligence" applied to smartphone RF front ends will improve battery life, reduce cost, and eliminate some components from the phone.

"The market has now reached a point where modem suppliers and RF components vendors will merge," commented Chief Analyst Joe Madden. "These two suppliers will have to work together in very intimate product development—a co-design of the modem and the RFFE. Without tight coordination, envelope tracking performance will suffer, and some suppliers will be left behind when it comes to 5G products."

"We've been able to identify how new technologies will improve performance beyond the Envelope Tracking approach in flagship phones today. The battery life improvement will be significant enough to justify a realignment of the industry, with mergers between modem vendors and RF suppliers."

This brief report outlines the strategic impact of new architectures that Mobile Experts has evaluated, explaining how impending improvements are materializing and will fundamentally change the strategic landscape. The strategic impact for companies such as Broadcom, Skyworks, Qorvo, Qualcomm, Intel, Mediatek, and Apple has been clearly outlined with respect to the upcoming technology disruption.

Subscribers to Mobile Experts research will receive the full report, which contains a summary for every initiative and technical benefit, the business case for edge computing in neutral host and operator scenarios, plans of eight key operators, and a five-year forecast. Subscribers will receive:

Full access to the Co-design of Smartphone Modems and RFFEs Expert INSIGHT;
5 detailed charts and figures;
Access to other Expert INSIGHTS and future publications; and
Access to the analysts behind the reports

To find out more about this report, click here. To find out how to subscribe, click here.

About Mobile Experts Inc.:
Mobile Experts provides insightful market analysis for the mobile infrastructure and mobile handset markets. Our analysts are true Experts, who remain focused on topics where each analyst has 20 years of experience or more. Research topics center on technology introduction for radio frequency (RF) and communications innovation. Recent publications focus on RFFE, Smart Cities, CBRS, Cellular IoT, 5G Broadband, Fixed Wireless, Edge Computing, Macro Base Stations, GkM, Backhaul, LPWA, Big Picture IoT, DAS, CRAN/VRAN, Small Cells, Enterprise Mobile Infrastructure , Backhaul and Fronthaul, 5G, and more.