Qualcomm used Samsung foundries for its Snapdragon 835 and the upcoming Snapdragon 845 chips due to the Korean company’s superior 10nm fabrication process. However, as per industry sources, TSMC has managed to win orders from Qualcomm for fabricating its Snapdragon 855 chipsets.

The report from Nikkei claims that Qualcomm would also be using TSMC’s foundries for fabricating one of its modem chips which it would be rolling out in the first half of 2018. As for Snapdragon 855, while TSMC would start fabricating it from the end of 2018, it would make its way inside smartphones that are released in early 2019. All these chips would be based on TSMC’s 7nm fabrication process. Apart from Qualcomm, TSMC would also be fabricating chips for Apple for the iPhone in 2018.

“Qualcomm is engaging TSMC to roll out a modem chip very soon in the first half of 2018 and TSMC will manufacture the mobile giant’s upcoming flagship Snapdragon processor, known as Snapdragon 855, before the end of next year,” according to chip industry executives familiar with the matter.

Many people were surprised when Qualcomm first ended up using Samsung’s foundries for its Snapdragon 835 chipset. While Qualcomm did get access to a better fabrication process, it also meant that the initial supply of Snapdragon 835 chips was exclusive to Samsung. This led to OEMs either delaying the release of their flagship devices at the beginning of this year or launch it with 2016’s Snapdragon 821 chip.

Samsung is losing out orders to TSMC because its 7nm fabrication is not expected to be ready in 2018. However, Qualcomm would likely end up transferring some of its orders back to Samsung once the Korean company’s foundries are ready to start churning out 7nm chips in 2019.

A lower fabrication process would lead to a chip becoming more power efficient whilst also packing in more transistors. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 835 chip used in the majority of Android flagships last year was based on the 10nm fabrication process while the upcoming Snapdragon 845 chip will be based on the second-generation 10nm from Samsung.