The Real Winner at Samsung's Galaxy Unpacked? Qualcomm and Its Snapdragon Chips - CNET

The Real Winner at Samsung's Galaxy Unpacked? Qualcomm and Its Snapdragon Chips - CNET centers on how Qualcomm’s Snapdragon became standard across Samsung’s newly announced devices. At Samsung’s Galaxy Unpacked in London on Wednesday, all three phones—the Galaxy Z Fold 8, Z Fold 8 Ultra, and Z Flip 8—use the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5. The Galaxy Watch 9 and Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 include Snapdragon Wear Elite, and Samsung and Google glasses unveiled at the event will run Snapdragon AR1 Gen 1. Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon described the Samsung relationship as a “rare partnership” built on innovation and collaboration within the Galaxy ecosystem. Analyst Ben Wood of CCS Insight called it a “clean sweep” for Qualcomm across categories. The article notes Samsung had previously used both Snapdragon and its own Exynos chips in phones, and relied exclusively on Exynos in smartwatches. It says Samsung stated the Snapdragon use in the Z Flip was driven by customer feedback. The piece links the shift to the growing importance of AI, connectivity, and power-efficient on-device computing, as Amon and Qualcomm leadership discuss optimizing Snapdragon for Galaxy.