Qualcomm is looking to capture the growing demand for on-device and agentic AI.

  • Analysts see new chip tiers helping smartphone makers differentiate devices as AI capabilities expand.
  • Former Motorola executive Sergio Buniac will oversee Qualcomm’s mobile, compute and XR businesses.
  • Retail sentiment remains bullish, with QCOM up 18% year to date.

Qualcomm Corp. is drawing attention among retail traders after unveiling its latest flagship Snapdragon processors, with analysts pointing to the chips as another potential growth lever as the industry shifts toward agentic AI.

Shares of the company were down 0.2% in Wednesday's premarket session, but are on track for their best month since May.

Futurum Group CEO Daniel Newman said Qualcomm’s data-center business is already benefiting from the agentic AI boom, which could drive upward revisions across CPUs, networking and accelerators. But he said investors should not overlook the opportunity in smartphones and other devices.

“It’s hard to ignore that Qualcomm stands to benefit from the Muse, Grok Bot, Instinct lift off too,” Newman said in an X post. He added that “agentic devices will get a boost,” creating another growth lever for Qualcomm regardless of which application ultimately wins the on-device agentic AI race.

Meta’s newly launched Muse AI agent as well as personal AI agent Instinct are notable examples of the shift toward autonomous AI. Instinct, known for handling real-world tasks such as emails, is reportedly seeking funding at a $10 billion valuation, while Muse has drawn praises from users and analysts alike.

Neil Shah, meanwhile, focused on Qualcomm’s decision to introduce two flagship tiers. “This is quite interesting positioning and tiering by Qualcomm Snapdragon,” he said on X, adding that the strategy could make more sense as OEMs, particularly Chinese smartphone makers, weigh how to differentiate their devices.

Two Snapdragon Chips Target Agentic AI

Qualcomm unveiled the Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 and Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 at its Snapdragon Summit this week. Both are built on a 2nm process and support on-device AI, gaming, imaging, and connectivity.  

The Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Extreme is Qualcomm’s top-end chip, featuring a 5GHz Oryon CPU, faster AI and graphics performance, plus advanced gaming and imaging capabilities. The standard Gen 6 also reaches 5GHz, with 10% faster CPU, 35% faster GPU and 14% faster NPU performance than its predecessor.

Shah said the differences “might look minor on a spec sheet,” but argued that advanced agentic AI and gaming could become meaningful performance differentiators.

Qualcomm Snaps Former Motorola Mobile Chief

Qualcomm said it hired Sergio Buniac, the former president of Motorola Devices, to lead its mobile, compute and XR businesses. Buniac spent more than three decades at Motorola and became President of Motorola Devices in 2018.  

His remit also covers Qualcomm’s next generation of AI devices. The appointment gives Qualcomm an executive with extensive experience taking consumer devices from design through commercialization as the company attempts to expand Snapdragon beyond smartphones and deeper into the emerging agentic AI ecosystem.

Retail View On QCOM

On Stocktwits, retail sentiment for QCOM was ‘bullish’ as of early Wednesday, unchanged since the start of the week, with the ticker trending among the top 10 on the platform at the time of writing.

“Samsung is expected to be the first major partner to ship the standard chip, with reporting naming both the Galaxy S27 and the Galaxy Z Fold 9 as the launch devices,” a trader said. “Beyond Samsung, Xiaomi, OnePlus, and iQOO are also rumored to be in line for early access to the new chips.”

Year to date, QCOM stock has gained 18%.

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