The Snapdragon X series of chipsets has carved its place in the computer industry, but Qualcomm has a ton of ground to cover in both adoption and technological improvements. The recent Snapdragon X2 Elite and Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme are ideal examples of the San Diego firm’s desire to take on its chip rivals, but it needs that extra boost that could be fulfilled by the recent hiring of former AMD executive Jason Banta. He will now serve as Qualcomm’s Vice President of Global Compute Sales, putting him in charge of consumer and commercial ‘go to market’ channels.
Banta’s 23-year career at AMD came to an end two weeks ago, making him an exceptional hire to boost Snapdragon X sales
With his LinkedIn post below, spotted by CRN, confirming his departure from AMD, Banta appears ready to take on the challenge of helping Qualcomm navigate a hyper-competitive market where companies like Apple, AMD, Intel, and MediaTek are moving at a lightning pace to deliver high-performance silicon with robust efficiency. Intel has recently mounted a comeback with its Panther Lake processors, which have been fabricated on the 18A node, with Apple preparing to potentially launch its M5 Pro and M5 Max on March 4.
“In PCs, the team has already built a solid foundation of technology, customer partnerships, and ecosystem enablement. I’m looking forward to this exciting journey with the Snapdragon team, as well as our customers and partners that will help us bring these solutions to everyone.”
Under his role as AMD’s corporate Vice President and General Manager of client OEM, Banta successfully propelled the processor manufacturer to new heights, with the firm achieving a new market share in laptop and desktop categories, leaving Intel behind. Qualcomm recently suffered a major blow to its chipset business when the man behind the company’s in-house Oryon CPU cores and the founder of NUVIA, Gerard Williams III, announced his departure after four years.
Despite Qualcomm keeping pace with its rivals in showcasing its latest and greatest chipsets, there is some polishing required. For instance, the Snapdragon X2 Elite tested with pre-production drivers, managed to beat Apple’s M5 in 3 out of 5 compute tests for the 18-core CPU configuration, its Adreno GPU needs massive tweaking. With the M5 Pro and M5 Max right around the corner, the Snapdragon X2 Elite is effortlessly steamrolled by the M5, even though it manages to extend its lead against the Snapdragon X Elite.
While Jason Banta isn’t necessarily responsible for the optimization of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X SoCs, he will have his work cut out in convincing OEMs why the latter’s ARM-based products are superior to alternatives. Hopefully, the next quarter will bring about some positive changes, so stay tuned for more updates.
News Source: CRN
About the author: Omar Sohail is a reporter and analyst for Wccftech's mobile section, specializing in the technology and business of the mobile industry. His expertise lies in the intricate hardware supply chain, covering developments in semiconductor manufacturing, chip lithography, and camera sensor technology.
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