Qualcomm slides on UBS price-target cut as smartphone chip shipments weaken

Stock slide follows UBS price-target cut

Qualcomm shares fell 2.6% on Friday, August 1, after UBS Group lowered its price target from $190 to $170 while maintaining a neutral rating. The stock traded as low as $146.15 and last traded at $147.61 on volume of roughly 13.76 million shares, about 17% below the average daily session. According to MarketBeat data cited in coverage, Wall Street now rates Qualcomm an average "Hold" with a consensus price target of $203.63, with other firms including Bank of America ($195), Evercore ($159), Goldman Sachs ($160), Lake Street Capital ("hold"), and Melius Research ($220) also weighing in recently.

Counterpoint flags a steeper smartphone SoC decline for Qualcomm

Counterpoint Research reported on August 1 that global smartphone system-on-chip shipments fell 15% in the first half of 2026 versus a year earlier, and that shipments from MediaTek (32% share) and Qualcomm (22%) each dropped more than 25%. Apple, Samsung and UniSOC gained share at the leaders' expense. Counterpoint senior analyst Shivani Parashar tied Qualcomm's premium weakness to the Samsung Galaxy S26 splitting silicon between the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 and Samsung's own Exynos 2600, and to sluggish sales of the Xiaomi 17 series. Generative-AI smartphone SoCs still grew 24% in the period, and Counterpoint warned memory supply is not expected to normalize before the second half of 2027.

Qualcomm explains 4NE-1 humanoid robot fall in Taipei

At the Taipei International Computer Show, a Qualcomm-powered NEURA Robotics 4NE-1 Gen 3.5 humanoid robot tilted backward and fell mid-demonstration. A Qualcomm spokesperson told Tom's Hardware that a brief communication fault triggered the platform's built-in "safe collapse" procedure, which the company said functioned as designed. The robot, built around the Dragonwing IQ10 reference design with about 700 TOPS of compute, had just handed a motherboard to a Qualcomm executive before the shutdown sequence activated; staff covered the unit with a cloth and removed it from the stage. Qualcomm said the episode would feed back into improving the robot's reliability.

congatec puts Dragonwing IQ-X into a compact edge-AI module

congatec unveiled the conga-HPC/mIQ-X, a 95 mm × 70 mm COM-HPC Mini module based on Qualcomm's Dragonwing IQ-X processors. It pairs an Oryon CPU with a Hexagon NPU delivering up to 45 TOPS of AI throughput, supports up to 64 GB of LPDDR5X memory, and operates across -40 °C to 85 °C. Target use cases span security, retail terminals, robotics, medical devices and industrial automation, with dual 2.5 GbE, up to 16 PCIe Gen3/Gen4 lanes, two USB4 ports and an integrated Adreno GPU capable of driving three 8K displays.

Redmi taps Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro for the K100 Pro Max

Redmi confirmed on August 1 that its K100 Pro series will launch in China on August 11, 2026, with the K100 Pro Max running the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro and the K100 Pro on the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5. The Pro Max is positioned as Redmi's most powerful flagship to date, featuring a 6.9-inch flat OLED display at 185 Hz, HyperOS 4 on Android 16, a Bose-tuned audio partnership, a rumored 9,000 mAh battery and a triple rear camera headlined by a 200 MP sensor.

Next milestone

Counterpoint's warning that smartphone memory supply will not normalize before the second half of 2027 points to a multi-quarter headwind, while Redmi's August 11 China launch will be the first commercial test of the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro.