Dimensity 9300 SoC to help MediaTek hike its market share to 35% this year

MediaTek took a gamble with its flagship Dimensity 9300 by configuring the chipset with four Cortex-X4 Prime CPU cores and four Cortex-A720 Performance CPU cores. There were no low-power Efficiency CPU cores employed by the Dimensity 9300 which also features the Arm Immortalis G720 GPU. The Dimensity 9300 application processor (AP) is powering the vivo X100 series and manufacturers are also using the chip to power flagship tablets such as the upcoming vivo Pad 3.

Per Economic Daily (via Wccftech), MediaTek grew its flagship chip revenue by 70% last year thanks to the Dimensity 9300 SoC which generated more than $1 billion in gross. Flagship chip revenue will grow by double-digits this year according tot he company. Morgan Stanley analysts Charlie Chan and Daisy Dai say that the Dimensity 9300 is the most powerful smartphone SoC currently in use and they expect MediaTek's share of the market to rise to as high as 35% in 2024 from the 20% it had last year. 

Analysts estimate that 20 million Dimensity 9300 chips will ship and give fellow fabless chip designer Qualcomm a challenge.

Later this year, during the fourth quarter, MediaTek is expected to introduce the Dimensity 9400 which has been going head to head with its rival, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4, in Geekbench tests. Once again, the flagship Dimensity chip will have a unique configuration including one Cortex-X5 Prime CPU core, three Cortex-X4 Prime CPU cores, and four Cortex-A720 performance CPU cores; there are no low-powered Efficiency cores.

The Dimensity 9400 SoC will be the first chipset to be manufactured using TSMC's 3nm process node. To be more specific, the Dimensity 9400 will be made using TSMC's N3E second-generation 3nm node. MediaTek CEO Rick Tsai said last month that the Dimensity 9400 AP will have AI capabilities that will rival other chipsets.

MediaTek might be able to take advantage of Qualcomm's anticipated price hike for the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 by giving its smartphone manufacturing clients a nice-sized discount that will force them to consider whether they would like to widen their profit margins by inking a deal with MediaTek. The chip designer is reportedly getting aggressive with pricing; a leaker recently said that MediaTek is rumored to have offered Samsung special pricing to use its Dimensity chipsets on low-end Galaxy phones.

The long-term goal could be to win over Samsung's confidence so that the manufacturer will use MediaTek's flagship chip on its Galaxy S and Galaxy Z foldables phones instead of the latest flagship Snapdragon AP.