The depature of Intel's Pat Gelsinger resulted in the chipmaker now being governed by two co-CEOs, with one of them making some scathing remarks of laptops powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite and Snapdragon X Plus. Apparently, customers are dissatisfied with these machines and are returning them at a high rate, and it is putting retailers in a worrying position.
Since Qualcomm's partners released machines powered by the Snapdragon X Elite and Snapdragon X Plus, a report revealed that only 720,000 units have been shipped, making up a negligible 0.8 percent of the market. While this figure is expected to grow in a couple of years, Michelle Johnston Holthaus, Intel's co-CEO, does not seem optimistic about Qualcomm's efforts. Speaking at the Barclay's Global Technology Conference yesterday, Digital Trends reported that she made bold claims about Qualcomm's progress.
The high return rate of these ARM-powered machines was concluded to be any retailer's 'number one concern,' as it signifies that customers are not satisfied with these products, and outlets stocking them have to endure exceptional losses. It is worth noting that Michelle Johnston Holthaus did not provide an exact figure of the return rate but states that 'x86 is the best overall basic architecture' and strongly believes in the future of this platform.
We can understand why Qualcomm's Snapdragon laptops would have a problem becoming a customer's daily driver, but these issues appear to be diminishing. For instance, various machines were priced a little too high, making Apple Silicon MacBooks a more attractive option. Secondly, the lack of native app support meant that the majority of programs would need to run through emulation. Fortunately, that does not appear to be a problem anymore, and if anything, the attractive discounts offered on various models would make them a worthy prospect.
An example of this is the ASUS Vivobook S 15, which is priced at an affordable $679.99 on Amazon but is kitted out with the Snapdragon X Plus, 16GB RAM, and 512GB of storage, making it an excellent starter package for the price. Also, Qualcomm's CEO had previously stated that the company intends to release Windows-powered notebooks for as low as $700 next year. Furthermore, a new unnamed Snapdragon X silicon is expected to arrive next year and will be found in $600 products, meaning that Qualcomm is gunning for the entry-level sector, creating more problems for Apple, Intel, and AMD.
It is understandable that Qualcomm would be in a tough position when it comes to Snapdragon laptop sales at this time, but as app support increases, along with the arrival of more affordable models, we should see the company's market share go up in the coming years.