Qualcomm unveils Snapdragon chips for on-device agentic AI

Qualcomm has spent years building on-device AI capabilities through Snapdragon platforms, integrating dedicated AI processors into its chips. The company's investment case has largely rested on smartphone demand, and it now says the next growth phase lies in agentic AI, where increasingly capable AI agents operate directly on consumer devices rather than in the cloud.

Beyond smartphones, Qualcomm is expanding across AI-powered devices, automotive systems, data centers, and physical AI applications. Earlier this month, it announced a multi-generation collaboration with Amazon to develop customised silicon for large-scale AI data centers, with a focus on AI inference. Management's view is that more AI processing will happen directly on devices, an area where it says it already has years of experience designing power-efficient chips.

Investors are weighing whether Qualcomm's position in on-device AI can produce a durable competitive advantage and unlock a new growth cycle. The stock trades at a forward GAAP P/E of 15.59x, below its 5-year average of 16.72x and below the sector's 29.51. Whether that gap narrows appears to hinge on whether Qualcomm's AI footprint across phones, cars, and data centers translates into growth that is less dependent on smartphone demand alone.