Wait till you see the number of actual chip vendors.
replyThere is about 3.. Broadcom, Qualcomm and MediaTek. Together they control I believe 100% of wifi chips used in routers and APs. Often it's sold as a package / system on chip so it's also the main cpu.
On the client side there is a little bit more competition but not much.
Client side don't you just add Realtek and Intel? I don't think almost anyone else does wifi chips.
replyYup. I might have forgotten Marvell in the list but yes, that is pretty much it.
replyI am also not sure of their exact market shares but I would suspect one or two are probably steering the majority of the "standards". I'd suspect Broadcom and Qualcomm to have the most influence.
I believe Intel is also a pretty prominent member in the standards committee. Mostly for historic reasons as I don't think they have too much market share outside of PC/laptop wifi modules.
replyBut I agree, Broadcom and Qualcomm are the heavy hitters.
Apple makes their own connectivity chips. It was a big blow for Qualcomm.
reply