Chinese smartphone major Vivo and South Korean tech giant Samsung jointly unveiled a 5G chip on November 7 in Beijing, marking the former's latest push to showcase its increasing emphasis on beefing up its research and development capabilities.
The Exynos 980 chip, which was jointly developed by the two companies, will debut on Vivo's X30 smartphone later this year.
Exynos 980 chip supports both non-standalone (NSA) and standalone (SA) networking modes, making it the second dual-mode 5G chip after Huawei's Kirin 990 5G. NSA and SA are two ways of constructing 5G network, with the former still relying on existing 4G infrastructure for some functions.
Currently, most 5G smartphones unveiled in China only support NSA mode. But China will kick off the large-scale construction of SA 5G network, so 5G phones will have to support two modes in future.
Vivo said at present, it has applied for more than 2,000 5G invention patents and submitted more than 3,000 5G proposals to 3GPP, a global organization supervising the international standards on 5G technologies.
Vivo has already unveiled several 5G devices in China, and its iQOO Pro targets middle-range consumers with a very aggressive pricing strategy. Its NEX 3 5G is positioned to appeal to premium segment.
It is followed by Samsung, Huawei, Xiaomi and other brands in 5G handsets, IDC said.
