iPhone’s Component Ecosystem: Synthesis

Over the last few weeks, we have reviewed the iPhone’s Component Vendors. Here is a recap of the articles:

iPhone’s Inside Beneficiaries provides an overview of the various players.

We covered Samsung, one of the top component providers, who also has the manufacturing and design capabilities to become the iPhone’s major competitor in the future. Samsung (0593Q:London Stock Exchange) accounts for approximately $76 or 30% of iPhone’s total component cost in the 8 GB version. Overall, I am very bullish on Samsung as a company, and deem it as one of the best positioned to leverage the convergence device movement. And if there’s one company that can make all this great stuff happen at a much lower price-point, Samsung is it!

We also covered Broadcom, Marvell, ST, TI, Micron, National Semi, Intel, Balda, and Infineon.

Of these, I really like Texas Instruments (Nasdaq: TI) as a company because of its deep technical expertise in hyper-integration, low-power design, etc. and a general innovation orientation. Balda, a German company, that is doing well because of its iPhone win, actually, is a dangerous investment in my view because it doesn’t own any defensible IP. All the UI related IP that it is getting credit for, belongs to Apple.

You may also want to read my iPhone and the Future series to review the iPhone’s positioning and competitive landscape, as well as an overview of the convergence device movement.