MediaTek has announced its latest SOC with an integrated 5G modem. The company has not confirmed any name for the Soc but I expect it to join MediaTek’s X series.
This new Soc features ARM’s Cortex-A77 cores and new Mali-G77 GPU. Both were announced only two days back. The chipset is based on TSMC’s new 7nm process-node and comes with MediaTek’s own Helio M70 modem IP. This SoC also comes with a new AI processing unit that MediaTek calls its most advanced yet. The company didn’t provide any detail but confirmed that it supports advanced AI applications.
M70 modem supports 5G NR in the sub-6GHz spectrum with up to 2x carrier aggregation. It supports both standalone as well as non-standalone 5G network architectures. So, it supports /3G/4G to bridge existing network access while 5G networks come. An important thing is that this model does not support millimeter wave 5G networks. This tech has only been adopted by US carriers so far.
Helio M70 model supports 4.7Gbps maximum download speeds and 2.5Gbps maximum upload speeds.
It supports 4K video encode/decode at 60fps and camera support of up to 80MP resolution.
The MediaTek 5G SoC will br ready by Q3 2019 and we can expect commercial devices by Q1 2020.
It’s been a while since MediaTek announced a high-end SoC. It announced Helio X30 back in 2017 that couldn’t do well but MediaTek saw good success with mid-range P series. Now when 5G is coming, the company didn’t want to miss a chance.
