Semiconductor Manufacturing International (SMIC) and Qualcomm have achieved a major milestone in fabrication of 28nm Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 processors, according to the companies. This milestone comes six months after the pair announced their initial plans to collaborate on 28nm wafer production.

This milestone also represents an important step for SMIC in the China-based foundry's 28nm process maturity. Qualcomm's Snapdragon 410 chips are designed to enable a new class of smartphones and tablets at the high-volume tier through offering integrated LTE, high-performance graphics and imaging, 1080P HD display, 64-bit capable processing and a range of advanced modem features.

"The successful yield of 28nm process technology on high-performance, low-power Snapdragon mobile processors represents a major milestone for SMIC in increasing our competitiveness in the global foundry landscape," said Tzu-Yin Chiu, CEO and executive director for SMIC. "Our collaboration with Qualcomm Technologies has been key in helping us to accelerate our 28nm technology development and achieve this key milestone within six months from the commencement of the collaboration. The maturity of our 28nm process represents a significant long-term growth driver for SMIC in support of Qualcomm Technologies and our customers globally."

"We're extremely pleased with the tremendous progress made by SMIC in achieving a critical milestone in 28nm process technology with the successful yield of Snapdragon 410 processors," said Murthy Renduchintala, executive VP of Qualcomm Technologies and co-president of QCT. "SMIC plays an important role in Qualcomm Technologies' supply chain in allowing us to expand our manufacturing footprint in China to better address the growing need for high- performance and low-power mobile devices with customers in the region and around the world."