Qualcomm CEO: AI won't replace your smartphone anytime soon Brian Sozzi · Executive Editor Thu, November 12, 2026 at 10:01 AM EST 3 min read QCOM +2.36% OPAI.PVT SNAP -2.81% TSLA -0.26% META -0.89% Explore stocks on Coinbase Trading disclosure Trading disclosure The above button links to Coinbase. Yahoo Finance is not a broker-dealer or investment adviser and does not offer securities or cryptocurrencies for sale or facilitate trading. Coinbase pays us for certain activity generated through this link. Prices displayed are informational.
Meta (META) has the Muse charm and AI-friendly glasses.
OpenAI (OPAI.PVT) is still testing an AI-forward hardware device.
Snap (SNAP) recently dropped its latest AI smart glasses.
And Tesla (TSLA) is starting to pump out humanoid robots.
But despite all the advancements in tech hardware, the good old smartphone will still have a starring role in our lives as AI becomes more powerful, according to Qualcomm (QCOM) CEO Cristiano Amon.
"There's something very interesting happening with the phone right now. In the short term, the phone market is, it's bad, right? It's suppressed because of memory prices. The market has been down in 2026, and 2027 is going to be probably flat to down. But the most important thing is that the phone is not going anywhere," Amon said at Yahoo Finance Invest.
Amon explained how AI — particularly agentic AI — will change how we use our phones. "You are going to continue to operate your phone for everything that's relevant to you, your apps, but you're going to have agents. They're going to operate the phone for you, and eventually, certain workloads, you're going to relegate to the agent," he said, adding that phones will "play a very important processing hub for a lot of the content and the sensing, even as workloads shift to glasses and other personal AI devices. So what we are seeing right now in the mobile space, a lot of traction with glasses, a lot of traction with different things like keychains for agents like the Muse, and watches are becoming interesting again, and a lot of processing on the phone. So, phone's not going to go anywhere. Workloads are going to shift, and eventually you're going to have a more powerful phone. We just need to go follow that transition."
Qualcomm remains a major player in the handset market even as it increasingly diversifies its business to auto technology and advanced AI chips.
Handset chips remained Qualcomm's single largest business in the most recent quarter. But smartphone processor revenue dropped 26% year over year to $5.14 billion in its fiscal fourth quarter due to industrywide memory shortages and Apple's (AAPL) transition toward in-house modems.
Across the entire 2026 fiscal year, smartphone sales accounted for $24.07 billion of the company's $37.21 billion total semiconductor revenue. Sales for the fiscal year dropped 13% from the prior year.
That mobile contraction was partially buffered by aggressive non-handset diversification, led by automotive chip revenue surging 89% to a record $1.99 billion.
"It's interesting when you think about the mobile industry, there's a huge cemetery of companies. You have companies that went from hero to zero, the ones that didn't see the change. We're actually fortunate enough that we survived all of those different transitions," Amon said.
Follow Brian Sozzi on X @BrianSozzi, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Tips on stories? Email him at brian.sozzi@yahoofinance.com.
