Qualcomm upheld its 5G smartphone shipment forecast for calendar year 2020, despite reporting a hefty drop in shipments in its fiscal Q2 (ended 29 March) and predicting an even steeper slide to come.

Though revenue increased 5 per cent year-on-year to $5.2 billion, net income plummeted 29 per cent to $468 million.

During an earnings call, executives attributed the slide to a 21 per cent drop in market demand for 3G, 4G and 5G handsets due to the Covid-19 (coronavirus) pandemic, resulting in a 17 per cent decrease in chip shipments to 129 million units.

Qualcomm estimated smartphone sales would fall 30 per cent in the current quarter, echoing an earlier warning from Samsung. However, the chip maker maintained its forecast for calendar year 5G shipments of between 175 million and 225 million units.

CEO Steve Mollenkopf said 5G deployments were “progressing as planned” despite the pandemic, adding OEMs are pushing hard to maintain their device launch schedules for 2020.

Alex Rogers, EVP and president of the licensing division, said Qualcomm is in a “good position” to benefit from nearly all the launches. He revealed the company recently signed long-term 5G licensing deals with Oppo and Vivo, and now has agreements in place with “all the top OEMs but Huawei”.

He added attempts to reach a new licensing pact with Huawei continue, following the lapse of a short-term agreement in June 2019.