Qualcomm to enable future smartphones with RFFE joint venture

QualcommQualcomm announced it has completed the acquisition of the remaining interest in RF360 Holdings Singapore, a joint venture with TDK Corporation.

The total purchase price was valued approximately $3.1 billion. TDK Electronics’ remaining interest in the joint venture was valued at $1.15 billion in August 2019.

The joint venture has produced RF front-end (RFFE) filters which enable Qualcomm to deliver end-to-end 4G/5G RFFE solutions.

The second generation RFFE solutions for its 5G portfolio will also enable OEM customers to design thin, high-performance, battery-efficient 5G multimode devices at scale and on time, Qualcomm said.

The advanced RFFE solutions are especially designed to enable future smartphones that can address the complex demands arising from 5G due to the new spectrum and wider bandwidths. OEMs can design thin, high-performance, battery-efficient 5G multimode devices at scale and on time, the company said.

Also, Qualcomm’s system-level innovations such as wideband envelope tracking and adaptive antenna tuning intelligently combine the modem and RFFE to help achieve best-in-class 4G/5G power efficiency, data speeds and coverage.

Qualcomm’s portfolio of RFFE products includes integrated and discrete micro-acoustic components utilizing RFFE filter technologies such as BAW, SAW, TC-SAW, as well as Thin Film SAW, all of which are core to developing and producing filters, duplexers, multiplexers for discrete, power amplifiers and diversity modules, as well as n-plexers and extractors for mobile phones and connected devices.

Cristiano Amon, president of Qualcomm, said, “We are excited about the strong adoption of Qualcomm Snapdragon 5G Modem-RF Systems in virtually all of our 150+ 5G design wins. Our systems approach has created a benchmark for 5G RFFE performance.”