Most manufacturers rely on chipset manufacturers such as Qualcomm and Mediatek for their processors to run their phones. Unfortunately this reliance on other companies is fraught with danger in these current times and as such OPPO are looking to shore up their supply lines by making their own mobile chipset.
Gadgets360 are reporting that OPPO are set to follow in the footsteps of Huawei and Xiaomi by developing their own processors in-house, having poached engineers from Spreadtrum and Mediatek. OPPO have filed a trademark with the European Union Intellectual Property Office and in it their processor is called the OPPO M1. This has all been gleaned from a report issued by the special assistant to the CEO of OPPO who shared the company-wide internal note to all the employees.
The plan to deliver the new chips is called the “Mariana Plan” and given that at their Inno Day last year OPPO said that they would invest CNY50 billion into R&D over the next three years to develop technologies in hardware, software and system.
Further supporting this report is the recent developments of realme and OnePlus technicians joining the core team suggesting that not only are OPPO looking to put maximum effort into their own chips but are also looking to share them with their fellow BBK Electronics stable members (which also includes Vivo).
The report from the executive also says that the chips are designed to be used on not just their smartphones but also their other hardware products. If realme, OPPO and OnePlus (and possibly Vivo) begin using in-house chipsets and join Huawei, Samsung, Apple and eventually Xiaomi (their first chipset tanked) that does not leave much market in the big sellers for Mediatek and Qualcomm — the above players are seven of the top 10 smartphone manufacturers of 2019.
Stay tuned and watch what developers over the next couple of years. With companies having so much control over their own chipsets you can be sure the integration of hardware and software can only improve.
