Some pondering thought...Who was the biggest winner when 2G exploded in volume? NOKia, a handset manufacturer. Not Texas Instrument, or any chip supplier.
It looks like, with 3G which is exploding right now, the winner seems to be Apple, another handset manufacture. The reality is that the gut of the phone is a commodity no matter how you slice it. The company with the brand made the most $$$$.
I say QCOM made a strategic mistake when it sold its infrastructure and handset business. As I recalled, back in 2003-4, during one of the conference call, then CEO Dr I.Jacob mentioned that, not owning the infrastructure/handset business caused QCOM to fall behind in WCDMA.
I then start to think.... Since QCOM doesn't have the infrastructure and handset businesses, who is going to help QCOM push CDMA monopoly beyond 3G? No one...
QCOM should have plowed back all its earning into making its infrastructure and handset businesses as cheap as possible on CDMA in order to kill or delay LTE or any other emerging standard. Think GSM->GPRS-EDGE...Instead, QCOM went on and wasted billions with FLO,MIRASOL,NETZERO???? There is no strategic focus from management. So now we have CDMA 3G->END.
I saw this movie before with Intel.... Intel were in xscale (ARM chip)/level one (CDMA chip), wimax. I believe Intel even went into building data center during the internet bubble when it was consider hot hot hot...
Management keep insisting on not competing with its customers
as the reason for selling the handset business.. I called it an excuse for not able to compete in the market place.
Samsung supplies tons of IC, DRAM, Flash, LCD,etc..yet they compete with everybody who bought their stuff.. Samsung build the A4 Chip for Apple and of course they also are in bed with Android...I believe it's call copetition.
Oh...Who was running the handset business before it was sold??? I think, if my memory serve me right, he is now at the helm... Yes...Dr Paul Jacob is the lucky kid with billions to spend without any strategic direction.
A Tech company transition to the new eara is not easy. IBM have to bet the company with its 360 system to make it big. IBM, however, couldn't foreseen the PC to move beyond mainframe. Intel, with all its might and $$$ couldn't moved beyond x86 microprocessor. Microsoft is spending and still losing billions trying to diversify away from its cash cow WindowOS/OFFICE... QCOM seems to be going through the same route unless Dr Paul Jacob have something up his sleeve that's revolutionary.
I have to give credit to management with the foresight to develop the snapdragon. I was excited when it was first announced. I say there's still some hope.... Unfortunately, the value is toward software/hardware as a platform. It would be better if BREW is wildly successful and somehow tie in with Snapdragon. That combo would be better to compete against the MediaTek of the world.
Apple changed its name to Apple Inc, dropping the word computer a few years ago.. S.Job had declared during its Ipad instroduction, Apple, the largest mobile device company. Apple transition from computer to mobile device in a decade. What will QCOM be 10 years? Will it be able to transform itself into something big or it will follow Intel's path of milking what it had...
Just pondering... |
