During CES 2026, Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon earlierConfirmed to the mediaQualcomm is currently in talks with Samsung about a 2nm manufacturing partnership. This marks the first time Qualcomm has publicly stated its consideration of returning to Samsung's fold since the two companies partnered on the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 computing platform in 2022.
Prior to this, Cristiano Amon had stated that he would maintain the model of cooperating with different contract manufacturers, but in recent years he has continued to use TSMC's process technology to produce his Snapdragon computing platform. During CES 2026 earlier, he confirmed that he had been in talks with Samsung about its 2nm process, and revealed that the work on the computing platform designed with Samsung's 2nm process has been completed and is expected to enter the commercial stage in the future.
To diversify risk and also to increase production capacity
The fact that Qualcomm, which currently maintains a cooperative relationship with TSMC, has announced a collaboration with Samsung to design products using the 2nm process may highlight that TSMC's new process capacity has been occupied by companies such as Apple, NVIDIA, and MediaTek. This forces Qualcomm to choose to cooperate with Samsung again to ensure a stable supply of its computing platform products through dual-foundry resources.
However, since the Snapdragon 888 and Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 were exclusively manufactured by Samsung, Qualcomm later switched to cooperating with TSMC due to issues with Samsung's process yield and the power consumption and heat dissipation of the designed products. This has led to a lack of confidence in Samsung's advanced process technology in the market.
However, this Qualcomm order will not only give Qualcomm more resources for product manufacturing, but may also restore market confidence in Samsung's manufacturing process technology.
Samsung actively improves yield rates, giving it an early lead in large Tesla orders.
In fact, Samsung's foundry business has recently seen good news, including reports that Tesla has signed a contract worth approximately $165 billion with Samsung to use its advanced process technology to produce its next-generation AI chip, codenamed AI6. If Samsung can further secure 2nm process manufacturing orders from Qualcomm, it will not only fill capacity gaps but also serve as a significant endorsement of the stability of its process technology.
Analysis: Is returning to Samsung an "option" or an "inevitable" outcome?
While Qualcomm has confirmed that it is in talks with Samsung, it has not yet confirmed whether its next-generation flagship computing platform will be immediately manufactured using Samsung's processes.
Judging from the current market situation, Qualcomm is more likely to adopt a "tiered" or "regional" strategy. For example, it may continue to keep the highest-end flagship chips, which are most sensitive to energy efficiency, at TSMC, while entrusting the production of second-tier flagship or specific market models to Samsung, or waiting for Samsung's 2nm process yield to truly stabilize before proceeding with further wafer starts.
For consumers, the most important factors remain the performance and power consumption of their devices. If Samsung's 2nm process can redeem itself from its past failures and resolve overheating concerns, then market confidence in "Samsung-made" processors may truly recover.
