Qualcomm reports massive increase in income, warns about chip shortage in H1 2021
Qualcomm has published its financial results for the past quarter, and they look mightily impressive. During the October-December period, marked as Q1 2021 in the fiscal year of the chip company, revenue increased 62%, while net income soared 165% from $925 million to $2.455 billion.
However during a call with investors, CEO Cristiano Amon warned the company is struggling to meet demand and the industry is facing a global shortage for the next six months.
| (in $ million) | Fiscal Q1 2021 | Fiscal Q1 2020 | Change |
| Revenue | $8,235 | $5,077 | 62% |
| Income | $2,455 | $925 | 165% |
Qualcomm supplies all major smartphone companies with chipsets but relies on TSMC and Samsung to manufacture them. However, in the context of the global COVID-19 pandemic, consumers started purchasing more computers to work from home and cars to avoid public transport, meaning companies in these industries also ramped up their chip orders.
Amon added that despite plenty of companies relying on just a handful of chip factories across the world, the bottleneck issue should be fixed by the second half of 2021.
Future Qualcomm CEO Steve Mollenkopf (left), and leaving Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon (right)
Apple has already reported it is failing to meet the demand of iPhone 12 devices due to “limited availability of some components”, with Qualcomm being the main provider of the 5G modem. General Motors, one of the biggest automakers in the world, will reduce production in three plants for the very same reason – lack of enough components to keep manufacturing going smoothly.
