More Evidence That Apple Could Be Developing Its Own 5G Modems

For a while now it has been rumored that Apple could be looking to develop their own modems. For a company that seems to love to do everything themselves where possible, it actually made a lot of sense. Now according to a report from The Telegraph, there is more evidence that Apple could indeed be working on their own modem, a 5G one no doubt.

According to the report, they claim that earlier this year, Apple had allegedly poached Intel’s lead engineer, Umashankar Thyagarajan. This was confirmed by the engineer’s LinkedIn profile which now lists Apple as his new employer. The Telegraph had also managed to get their hands on what appears to be a leaked email where Intel executives explained how Thyagarajan had played a key role in developing Intel modems that were used by the 2018 iPhones, and how he had been the project engineer on Intel’s 5G modem.

Apparently Apple’s poaching of the engineer was enough to force Intel to reshuffle their 5G project, although as some of you might have heard by now, Intel has since announced their decision to quit 5G modems, where this was due to Apple and Qualcomm reaching a settlement agreement which would see Apple use Qualcomm’s tech for future iPhones.

It was also reported that Apple, at some point in time, were actually in discussions with Intel about potentially buying their modem business (or at least parts of it).

Tyler Lee
Categories: Apple, Cellphones
Tags: 5G, Intel, iPhone