Name: Why the iPhone 15 Is Missing a Chip From Apple
Uploaded: 2023-09-25T18:05:00Z
Duration: 6 min 30 s
Description: Apple wants to cut its ties with chip designer Qualcomm but despite years of work and billions of dollars, the company hasn’t been able to build a wireless chip in-house. WSJ reporter Aaron Tilley joins host Zoe Thomas to explain Apple’s spectacular failure in this effort. Photo: David Paul Morris, Brent Lewin/Bloomberg

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Apple wants to cut its ties with chip designer Qualcomm but despite years of work and billions of dollars, the company hasn’t been able to build a wireless chip in-house. WSJ reporter Aaron Tilley joins host Zoe Thomas to explain Apple’s spectacular failure in this effort. Photo: David Paul Morris, Brent Lewin/Bloomberg

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Why the iPhone 15 Is Missing a Chip From Apple

Zoe: Welcome to "Tech News Briefing." It's Monday, September 25th. I'm Zoe Thomas for the Wall Street Journal. When Apple introduced the iPhone 15 earlier this month, it was missing something. Apple's own silicon chip to connect the phone to wireless carriers. The iPhone maker has spent years and billions of dollars trying to develop a chip that could allow it to sever ties with chip designer Qualcomm, people familiar with the matter have told us. But obstacles got in the way. According to former company engineers and executives familiar with the project, many of those were of Apple's own making. Here to talk about this is our reporter, Aaron Tilley. So, Aaron, Apple has been getting its wireless chips from Qualcomm, why does it wanna sever those ties?

Aaron: So Apple's wanted to cut out Qualcomm for a while. It really doesn't like Qualcomm's business model where essentially they both buy the chips from Qualcomm, these modem chips that connect to cellular networks, as well as having to pay Qualcomm patent royalties. Qualcomm has tons and tons of patents accumulated over decades in cellular wireless, and as a result, mobile phone carriers like Apple have to pay them a lot of money per phone.

Zoe: Do we know how much Apple spends with Qualcomm?

Aaron: So it's estimated Apple paid Qualcomm nearly $10 billion last year. That's between both the chips and the patent fees.

Zoe: Apple has been able to build some microprocessors in-house. What are the differences in trying to make one of these modem chips versus trying to build a chip for say its Mac computers or iPads?

Aaron: Yeah, Apple's seen as one of the best premier chip designers for processors. They've done a phenomenal job building their own processing chips for their phones, their iPads, and now their MacBook computers for the past few years. And it's been a huge differentiator for them 'cause the products run smooth and fast, low energy, and just a lot better than their competition. But the move into building a cellular modem, this is quite a different challenge. This is kind of a whole brand new skillset. In particular, there are these very kind of narrowly defined set of standards around how the chip works, and there's all sorts of nuances among each network. Plus you're having to address a range of these cellular wireless standards. So that latest is 5G, but as well as previous generations like 2G, 3G and 4G. So building this piece is a matter of experience, and only a few companies have been able to keep up with this in cellular wireless. Qualcomm is the leader here. You have China, Huawei, you have MediaTek in Taiwan, Samsung also does some of this.

Zoe: How did Apple build out its team to create this modem chip?

Aaron: So one big moment in the history of this project was in 2019, they bought a part of Intel, which was producing their modem, a chunk of their team, 2,200 people from Intel. They announced the opening of an office in San Diego, this engineering hub, where they're gonna hire 1,200 people. And that was a pretty clear message to Qualcomm and the market that they want Qualcomm talent

Zoe: You talk about its complexity and the number of people that Apple brought in to help build this. Was it able to design a modem chip then?

Aaron: Yeah, they've been at work at it. They produced a prototype part last year. And my understanding from people who worked on it, who saw it, who saw the results is that it just was performing far behind the state of the art from Qualcomm.

Zoe: Tell us about some of the internal dynamics of the team that was working on this.

Aaron: So the people in charge of this project, according to my sources, really don't have a big background in wireless technology. They're part of the core team involved in the processors that Apple's build. And so that has frustrated some of the wireless veterans Apple's brought in. These are people with decades of experience in building these parts, and the leaders of the project don't have that type of experience.

Zoe: How far behind was Apple's modem chip compared to Qualcomm's, then?

Aaron: So I heard the prototype part that they produced in 2022 was running around three years behind the latest state of the art from Qualcomm. And that's like in speeds and feeds, the uploads and download speeds that you're able to get with this part.

Zoe: So it didn't release the modem chip with the iPhone 15. What comes next, then, for Apple in this attempt?

Aaron: Well, they're certainly not gonna give up. They did extend their chip supply deal with Qualcomm recently until 2026. But they're gonna keep at it.

Zoe: Just how big of a game changer would it be for say an Apple user if they have an Apple modem chip inside their phone? Does it matter?

Aaron: So probably not. I mean, Apple will be able to do some special things by owning its own modem. They'll be able to integrate it into their processing chip so it'll have maybe better performance on battery or just overall the system will work better, but are we gonna notice it? Like the transition to 5G hasn't been this world-changing event that has completely changed how we use our phones. So it's just not the most exciting part of these phones anymore.

Zoe: That was our reporter, Aaron Tilley. And that's it for "Tech News Briefing." Today's show was produced by me, your host Zoe Thomas, with supervising producer Melanie Roy. We'll be back tomorrow. Thanks for listening.

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