Qualcomm releases new wireless earbud SoC

Qualcomm has released a range of new system on chip (SoC) wireless audio devices, with the stars of the show featuring Bluetooth 5.2, the new, soon-to-be-released Bluetooth Low Energy standard, and power-efficient audio processing.

The QCC3050 is an ultra-low power, single-chip solution, optimised for use in wireless earbuds and designed to support Qualcomm Snapdragon Sound Technology. Qualcomm says it is designed specifically to help manufacturers to differentiate at a range of tiers by bringing a quad-core architecture and support for premium audio technologies in the very fast-moving, price-sensitive truly wireless earbud category. It is also designed to support the forthcoming Bluetooth Low Energy Audio standard, and helps early-adopting OEMs to develop truly wireless earbuds with the new audio sharing use case.

Qualcomm provided the following information on what consumers can expect from earphones with these new chips:

• Extremely low-power performance
• Designed to support forthcoming Bluetooth LE Audio standard
• Bluetooth 5.2 radio
• Ultra-small form factor
• Powerful quad-core processor architecture – designed to support complex use cases
  • Dual-core 32-bit processor application subsystem (up to 80Mhz)
  • Dual-core 120Mhz configurable Qualcomm Kalimba DSP audio subsystem (runs from ROM)
• Qualcomm TrueWireless Mirroring technology for improved robustness and a superior user experience
• Designed to support wake word and button-activated digital assistants including Amazon Alexa Voice Service and Google Assistant
• Support for Google Fast Pair
• Software architecture compatible with Qualcomm QCC302x and QCC304x series
• Embedded ROM + RAM 
• Integrated FLASH memory for application boot
• High-performance audio combined with low-power consumption
  • Qualcomm aptX Adaptive audio for consistent, high quality streaming over Bluetooth at up to 96Khz audio resolution
  • Qualcomm aptX Voice for superior call quality on uplink and downlink
  • 8th generation Qualcomm cVc Echo Cancelling and Noise Suppression
• 1-ch 99.3dBA Class-D
• 1-ch 101dBA Class-AB
• Support for Qualcomm Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) – feedforward, feedback and hybrid – and Qualcomm Adaptive Active Noise Cancellation