There were an estimated 115.1 million smartphone APs (application processors) shipped in the China market during the third quarter of 2014, representing an increase of 11.7% on quarter and 25.1% on year, according to data from the recently published Digitimes Research China Smartphone AP Tracker Service.

According to the report, Taiwan-based MediaTek was the largest AP vendor, accounting for 52.1% of shipments, while Qualcomm followed with a 23.5% share. Spreadtrum Communications (11.7% share), HiSilicon Technologies (5.2% share) and Leadcore Technology rounded out the top 5, while Marvell and Nvidia trailed the market, Digitimes Research indicated.

While MediaTek did launch single-chip (MT6595, MT6732 and MT6752) LTE SoC solutions late in the third quarter, the Taiwan-based design house depended mainly on 3G solutions for its third-quarter AP shipments. For Qualcomm, its MSM8916 accounted for a large portion of its third-quarter AP shipments. China-based Spreadtrum focused on shipments of inexpensive 3G APs.