Qualcomm SoC series to bring true wireless earbud features

New SoCs designed to meet demand for advanced wireless audio use cases and end-to-end support for Bluetooth LE Audio

Qualcomm Technologies has unveiled the Qualcomm QCC305x SoCs, which the company says are designed specifically to help its customers differentiate across a range of tiers in the very fast-moving truly wireless earbud category. Additionally, the QCC305x will look to support the forthcoming Bluetooth Low Energy Audio standard, so that early-adopting OEMs can begin to develop an end-to-end implementation with smartphones and truly wireless earbuds supporting the exciting new audio sharing use case.

“We are entering a new era for the expanding truly wireless earbud category, which is diversifying at a terrific rate bringing new use-cases and feature enrichment to products in virtually all tiers,” said James Chapman, vice president, and general manager, Voice, Music, and Wearables, Qualcomm Technologies International, Ltd.. “Not only do our QCC305x SoCs bring many of our latest-and-greatest audio features to our mid-range truly wireless earbud portfolio, they are also designed to be developer-ready for the upcoming Bluetooth LE Audio standard. We believe this combination gives our customers great flexibility to innovate at a range of price points and helps them meet the needs of today’s audio consumers, many of whom now rely on their truly wireless earbuds for all sorts of entertainment and productivity activities.”

The 2020 Qualcomm State of Play Report shows that noise cancellation, making hands-free voice calls and mobile video watching or gaming are among the most popular end-use cases for truly wireless earbuds today, with usage in a range of environments outside as well as inside the home. The QCC305x offers more robust connectivity, low-power optimization, and rich feature integration necessary compared to our previous offerings, to support these applications, as well as providing access to a wide choice of differentiating audio technologies for this new era of truly wireless audio.

Qualcomm told Incisor.TV that premium audio technologies available with the QCC305x include:

Audio sharing use case – sharing from one smartphone to multiple wireless listeners at the same time – looking to meet the forthcoming Bluetooth LE Audio standard.
Voice service support with always-on wake word activation or button press activation to assist with total hands-free earbud control
Qualcomm Adaptive Active Noise Cancellation for superior sound quality while mitigating for differences in fit and activity of the user
Qualcomm aptX Adaptive at up to 96Khz audio resolution, for high quality listening and low latency streaming while watching videos or gaming
Qualcomm aptX Voice and Qualcomm cVc Echo Cancellation and Noise Suppression for top voice clarity on calls

The QCC305x SoCs are designed to support end-to-end operability from a Qualcomm Snapdragon powered smartphone to Qualcomm-Technologies powered earbuds. To help deliver this experience, the recently announced Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 Mobile Platform, with the Qualcomm FastConnect 6900 connectivity system, apparently brings mobile-side support for Bluetooth 5.2, LE Audio, aptX audio and other features providing further interoperability benefits.