Welcome to episode 238 of the G2 on 5G. It's
the latest Insight Scoop on everything 5G and
6G. We cover six topics in about 20 minutes,
and it's brought to you by Moore Insights and
Strategy. I'm Will Townsend, and joining me again
this week is fellow analyst Anshul Saag. Let's
get started, my friend, with my first topic,
and I want to talk about AST Space Mobile. I've
actually got a low Earth orbit. satellite -themed
set of topics this week. But I'm going to start
first with AST. And news has broke that they
have conducted the first space -based 4G VoLTE
call with Bell Canada. This includes voice, it
includes broadband, data connectivity, and video
streaming. And you and I have talked about AST
on many episodes of our podcast. They've had
some delays in launching their production satellites.
They've got line of sight to that now. I shared
some details earlier this week or last week about
that. But this is another great example of their
tech stack, number one. And number two, this
just paves the way to production and monetization
from my standpoint. So what do you think about
all that, my friend? I think it's an interesting
expansion of their capabilities. And it makes
sense when you consider how rural Canada is.
It actually makes even more sense in the United
States. So, yeah, I think it's a good move and
they have such good partnerships around the world
that it makes total sense. Yeah, for sure. And
you're absolutely right about Canada. What's
really interesting, you have these like wide
expanses in between several clusters of very
highly populated cities. I think this is going
to be transformative with respect to. coverage
gaps and that sort of thing in Canada. But it'll
be fun to watch for sure. But hey, let's go to
your first topic. And I know that you are hanging
out in Hawaii. It's your annual rite of passage,
right? Qualcomm Snapdragon Summit. And I was
paying attention to your live tweets and all
of that. There was quite a bit that was announced
this year, right? Yeah, it was quite a big summit
this year. There's a lot to talk about, so I'm
going to make it as fast as I can because it
would take up the whole podcast if I just drum
it on. Basically, they launched two new SoCs,
one for smartphones, one for PCs. Both of them
use the third generation Orion custom processor
that they created in -house, which is ARMv9 compatible.
And it's really interesting because that CPU,
both in mobile and on PC, is the fastest CPU.
in the respective markets for arm so it's faster
than apple and i did some benchmarks and their
soc for mobile is faster than apple's latest
a19 Pro, which I have in front of me, both in
the iPhone Air, which I didn't have a visual
representation of before, but I do now. And then
on top of that, the X2, so it's a Snapdragon
X2 Elite, which is for PCs. And that's a five
gigahertz mobile processor, which is a big deal
as well, because that's way faster than anything
Apple has. Competitively, it's faster than an
M4, but it's about... on par with an m4 pro which
is really impressive when you consider how capable
apple is and how long they've been doing this
in addition to that the pc parts have a built
-in modem it's a i believe it's a 4g modem and
it's called guardian and it's actually for remote
like access to the pc so even if the pc is turned
off and you're like an it person you can actually
manage turn on the pc remotely through a highly
secure component so it's designed so it's a very
secure enclave so you can like remotely manage
your pcs for your infrastructure that's a really
interesting unique feature and there's multiple
ways of implementing it but if you have a modem
built into the pc that's the easiest way and
there will be 5g modems for both devices interestingly
enough the x85 for the snapdragon 8 elite gen
5 which is the full mobile soc name and then
a snapdragon x75 for the for the pc part because
there's less demand for the ultimate high -end
5g modem in pcs you can use the x85 in both but
they expect that most people won't be using their
most high -end 5g modem and then on top of all
that qualcomm's ceo said on stage that they expect
to have pre -commercial 6g devices in 2020 as
early as 2028 which i take to mean probably some
kind of prototypes but working ones, and most
likely be aligned with the Olympics, which happened
with 5G, if you remember. I have a feeling we'll
get some 6G demos and some 6G trials in LA, and
they're probably already planning for them. Yeah.
Hey, the Guardian thing is really interesting.
That's silicon, right? That's like blue to trots.
Is that how they're implementing that? Yeah,
so Guardian is going to be hard built into the
SOC. It is for security and management. It was
probably one of the least talked about things,
but there's actually a lot of detail about it
because there's so many components of the SoC
that you can really like take advantage of it.
Really, I think at the enterprise, but even at
the consumer level, you could be a consumer who
needs remote. locate and wipe and lock. And those
are all things you could do on your PC that you
previously couldn't. And then you could also
have that as another layer of theft protection
because you can lock your PC basically anytime.
And yeah, I just think that there's a good opportunity
to move, move management towards a cellular based
experience. Yeah, no, I agree. And it's just,
it's impressive how Qualcomm continues to raise
the bar. and integrate new features and this
is something new so i was surprised to learn
about it myself and i'll be digging into it a
little bit further because it crosses my coverage
area as well you typically cover security on
in devices and i cover more of the infrastructure
side of things but i love that feature and i
think that's going to be really obviously advantageous
and obviously in corporate environments where
IT staffs have to be able to manage devices,
not only smartphones, but PCs. So good stuff,
my friend. Let's go to my second topic, and I'm
going to stick to the low Earth orbit satellite
theme. I want to talk about T -Mobile, and they
had an official announcement today around T -Satellite.
We talked about T -Satellite when they launched
it in production. Now, very quickly after that
initial launch, they have basically announced
app support. for that service with Starlink.
And they're focused on, it's not, it's not the
entire app ecosystem, but it's covering their
T -Life app, which is something that I use to
manage my FWA service within my home in Bastrop.
But we've also got some really interesting solutions,
some app solutions that they're supporting. AllTrails,
which is exactly what it sounds like. It's for
hikers, cyclists, runners. And it maps in over
500 ,000 trails around the world. AccuWeather,
we're all concerned about the weather and what
we're going to wear when we step out the door.
AccuWeather is going to get support. And there
are a number of other solutions, including WhatsApp
and even X as well. This is pretty impressive.
And so it's definitely taking the usability for
SOS and emergencies to new levels. And it's quite
impressive. They continue to keep the pace going
with respect to their T -Satellite service and
what they're doing. And we're going to begin,
I think, to see future expansion into first responder
and other use cases. But you're an app guy. What
do you think about all this? Is this going to
move the needle? Is this going to be compelling
for T -Mobile? I think so. I think the problem
is it's still fundamentally a niche service.
Right. Because there's just not that many people
who are... regularly going into places without
service. So there's definitely a certain type
of person who will benefit from this. But I think
ultimately, a lot of these things are very situational
and month to month almost. So I think there's
some really good benefits to it. But I think
that the problem is that you have to really live
in these places. And the truth is, living in
these places, there's not that many people. But
I think people who... are regularly outdoors.
These are great apps, great services. But I think
they also have to do marketing for awareness.
So when people are out of service, that they
know that this is something that they can rely
on. And that's a marketing problem. But ultimately,
I think satellite for smartphones is still pretty
limited. Yeah, it is. And this is just the start,
I think, of what's to come. But it's quite compelling
from my perspective. Yeah, good stuff there.
Let's shift to your second topic. And you want
to provide an update on MediaTek and a new Dimensity
solution. Yeah. So in addition to Qualcomm Snapdragon
Summit, we also got new mobile SOCs from MediaTek,
specifically the Dimensity 9500. This was their
new flagship part. And they already... announced
a bunch of OEMs who are going to take advantage
of it. This one uses the latest IP from Arm.
So this is a new Arm IP that was announced a
few weeks ago. And that IP is new CPU that's
called the C1. And then there's the G1, which
is the GPU. And so basically it takes all the
highest and newest capabilities from both those
companies and leverages them effectively. And
it's a new SoC, so it's going to be fast in a
lot of ways. And it's going to allow for better
performance, lower power efficiency, or better
power efficiency, lower power, better ray tracing.
They said it doubled the ray tracing capabilities.
And MediaTek also implemented their own NPU in
there, which is a very high performance, but
also low power NPU. So they're really looking
at trying to level up a lot of the flagship offerings
that they have currently in the US flagship.
MediaTek processors are only in the Samsung Galaxy
tabs. But abroad in China, a lot of the Oppo,
Vivo, Xiaomi's like to use MediaTek processors
in their flagship phones. And yeah, I think they're
going to be very competitive with what Qualcomm
has, but I'm not sure they're actually going
to be able to surpass them, which is fine. They're
always chasing each other and trying to outdo
one another. And yeah, I think there's a lot
of room for MediaTek and Qualcomm to compete
with one another. offer the best that's available
for android yeah they updated the 5g modem too
oh okay that makes sense yeah mediatek's always
been the fast follower to qualcomm and for many
years they were positioned as a value play to
qualcomm let me ask you this so when you look
at the current roadmaps for qualcomm and mediatek
i mean from a performance standpoint qualcomm
continues to push the envelope but is is mediatek
gaining ground what's the difference here in
performance I think that it's still double digits.
You're still looking to 20, 30 % for both CPU
and GPU. But the truth is that Qualcomm is doing
the same thing. Apple's making lots of improvements
as well. I will say, if anything, these Android
guys are catching up to Apple. I think based
on the performance that I saw, Qualcomm has effectively
caught up or beat Apple. But MediaTek isn't quite
there, but they're close. And I think that's
a real... interesting reality is that Android
SoCs are becoming much more competitive. Yeah.
And when you look at the Android ecosystem as
well, in my experience, I mean, I've been an
iPhone user for years. I think at one point I
did flip back to Android, but then I went back
to iOS because my home automation stuff just
works well. I like the user interface. In fact,
I picked up an iPhone Air. So it's my first week
with it. I'm loving it. I just, the UI and the
ecosystem is super compelling. The one knock,
and I knew this because I was talking to you
about it because I was debating, because I was
moving from the 15 Pro Max and I was debating
between the 17 Pro Max and the Air. And it's
the battery life. And certainly the battery is
small capacity on the Air, but I'm loving the
lightweight. I'm loving the design. I'm not currently
using a case with it. I don't know if that's
smart because I can be clumsy sometimes, but
what's been your experience with the iPhone Air
since we're on the subject? It's been pretty
good. We'll say because it's not my primary smartphone,
I can't really make an assessment on the battery
life, but I was actually impressed that the performance
when I benchmarked it against the iPhone 17 Pro,
almost identical. It's a few percentage points
difference. I don't feel like you're sacrificing
that much on performance with the Air, but you
might be on battery life. I haven't done a 5G
comparison across both devices, but I have a
feeling that the iPhone Pro is probably going
to have a faster modem. Yeah, my experience,
definitely I noticed a difference in battery
life. So I've ordered a slim, massive battery
to carry with me when I travel because I don't
want to put a big, thick battery on this beautiful
phone. And I thought the half an inch smaller
screen would be an issue, but... But it's not
really affecting my productivity. So I'm a total
fan. We'll see. I'm still in my honeymoon. It's
just a weekend. But so far, I'm impressed. And
it's also great to hear that companies like MediaTek
and Qualcomm are raising the bar on performance
and getting to that Apple level and, in some
instances, exceeding that level as well. So it's
just great. It's raising the bar in performance
for any user, whether you're iOS or you're Android.
But hey, with my third topic, I want to talk
about something that I found pretty interesting.
There are a couple of articles written this week
about China and how China is now using that in
the name of national security. They're using
some security controls to block Ericsson and
Nokia. And this has been a trend that's been
going on for quite some time. when all of the
rip and replace of chinese infrastructure began
however many years ago that was four or five
years ago and something that you and i have talked
about quite a bit on this podcast china slowly
when you look at when you looked at nokia's and
ericsson's market share just even four years
ago i think in the china market it was 12 to
14 on average today it's four percent so it's
been shrinking dramatically and these articles
that broke i found one on business standard talks
about how What China is doing is for foreign
infrastructure providers, they're putting them
through these very rigorous certifications and
security testing. What we saw other countries
doing with Chinese infrastructure, and obviously
that's only on foreign infrastructure. It's not
a requirement with Huawei or ZTE. And what that
does is it's created three to four month windows
of certification that are slowing their progress.
A lot of times these infrastructure providers
aren't even providing the full kit portfolio
out of fear that they'll spend all that time
and all that effort. And there's probably dollars
attached to that as well. And then there's no
certification. So I just thought it was interesting
to bring this up as a topic because it's like
now China is doing to the West what the West
did to it with all this rip and replace. So I
don't know if you've caught any of the articles
this week, but I'm not surprised. Are you surprised?
No, not in the slightest. But I will say, I love
me some geopolitics. I know you do. Thanks for
the softball. I'm not talking about baseball
now. But I really think it's a big deal, to be
honest with you. The Chinese market has always
been a homegrown market. It has been for probably
the last 10 years, if not longer now. So while
I think that this is very much tit for tat. Realistically,
I don't think Nokia or Ericsson are particularly
surprised or upset or expecting much. I'm surprised
that they're shipping anything in China, to be
honest with you, considering Huawei and ZTE and
their role there. I don't know. I think, if anything,
the Chinese carriers would want to have more
choices so that they could get better pricing
from Huawei and ZTE if that's possible. But generally
speaking, this is more like of a paper. thing
than real business impact in my eyes. Yeah. Yeah.
When you look at their market share in four years
ago, 12 to 14%, that's not a, that's not a big
piece of their tab. Right. And now it's four.
So. yeah it's just interesting tit for tat we
live in an interesting world these days with
geopolitics not only within tech but other areas
as well but yeah totally but hey so you for your
third and final topic this is pretty big news
and i caught it as well and i know that you've
had some journalists and bound into you about
this but arm and qualcomm there was a lawsuit
that was settled but the battle continues right
yeah so this Is this the battle that refuses
to end? As most big legal battles do, I would
say most of them end up in a settlement of some
kind. Yeah. But there's something different about
this case. And the truth is Qualcomm ended up
looking pretty victorious late last year, where
two of the three, they were victorious in two
out of the three counts against them that were
levied by arm. And the third one was settled
this week by the judge saying that Qualcomm.
Actually, their subsidiary, Anuvia, who they
bought, was not in breach of contract. But the
thing is that, one, ARM has already appealed
or says that they've appealed this verdict because,
okay, they believe that they can do that. But
also, Qualcomm does have another lawsuit that
they filed against ARM in the middle of last
year pertaining to this whole contract and licensing
dispute. I do not have an update on that lawsuit.
But that is very much so in movement. So I believe
that this is a combination of Arm not giving
up and Qualcomm not giving up either. Because
I really thought Qualcomm would drop their lawsuit
once the Arm thing against them had been settled.
Clearly, they're choosing to keep this legal
dispute going. And truthfully, I was really hoping
that the two companies would bury the hatchet
once this was over. But clearly, they haven't.
I don't really think it's going to work out for
ARM, to be perfectly honest with you. And I think
ultimately it's a net negative for everyone,
for this dispute to continue. But I think that
this is more about something more than just IP.
And I can't really put my finger on it because
we don't have all the facts. We all have only
the facts that have been... public knowledge
yeah i mean there's there's just really bad blood
between these two companies right yeah someone
else's mother like a nasty name or something
there there's something more to this to your
point than just the intellectual property and
what all depends from a licensing perspective
with exactly i would say there's something personal
right and the truth is that i don't think it's
good for either company and i really hope that
it's just ends fairly soon. But yeah, in general,
I think that there's no real good outcome for
this. And I was really hoping that they would
settle and they haven't. Yeah, it didn't really.
I wish I had more answers. But the truth is,
I think this just needs to go away. And I think
that's everyone's and everyone's best interest.
It's just a distraction. And it's both companies
are paying attorneys gobs of money to keep lawyers
win. Yeah. Hey, my friend, it's been another
great podcast. Why don't you take us home? Absolutely.
We hope our viewers and listeners found this
week's topics interesting. If anyone out there
would like to provide insights on a specific
5G topic for a future podcast, please reach out
to us on social media. Will is at WillTownTech
and I'm at Anshul Saag. We hope you have a great
weekend and please tune in again next week. And
don't forget to rate and subscribe.