Nearly nine billion wireless connectivity chipsets to ship during 2019

Annual wireless connectivity chipset shipments across Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, NFC, GPS, and ZigBee show no sign of slowing down, reaching almost nine billion annual shipments in 2019, finds ABI Research (www.abiresearch.com).

Had it not been for combo chipsets and integrated platforms the number of chipsets shipped would have been even higher. Cumulative chipset shipments from 2010 through 2014 will have reached over 21 billion; during the next five years from 2015 to 2019, cumulative shipments will almost double to over 39 billion.

“That is over 60 billion wireless connectivity chipsets that will have shipped over the ten year span from 2010 to 2019, driven by the emergence of new device types,” says research director Philip Solis. “There is constant change in the wireless connectivity space across wireless connectivity technologies, versions of technologies, and levels of integration at the same time.”

The vast majority of wireless connectivity chipsets – 60% – will be standalone during 2014, and this share will increase to two-thirds of the market in 2019. Integrated platforms will remain relatively steady in share over the next five years. In contrast, combo chipsets will remain steady in shipment volume, but fall in share. With regards to smartphones, Broadcom dominates combo chipset solutions and Qualcomm dominates integrated platforms with wireless connectivity.

In the overall market, Broadcom, Intel, Marvell, MediaTek, and Qualcomm Atheros are all strong players in standalone Wi-Fi chipsets. In the overall market for standalone Bluetooth chipsets, Broadcom, MediaTek, and RDA are strong. Broadcom is well ahead in the overall market for combo chipsets.

“Wireless connectivity chipsets go into a vast array of types of products, and the dynamics of connectivity technologies and integration levels varies among them resulting in the aggregate effects we see,” adds Solis. “The technologies and integration level are going to be different in smartphones versus home automation versus other product types in the Internet of Things.”