He claimed that business opportunities for 5G hardware supply chains are not visible for the moment.

Although some telecom operators in the US are racing to launch 5G services in the first quarter of 2019, many operators worldwide have yet to recoup their investments in 4G licenses and network establishments, Huang said.

He told Digitimes that this, coupled with many electronics components for 5G applications still not reaching maturity levels, will lead to costly 5G operations.

Huang said that the popularity of 5G technological applications and services will not come for a few years.

While Qualcomm has just released its latest mobile chipset Snapdragon 855, touted as the world's most powerful smartphone SoC, at the annual Snapdragon Technology Summit,  Huang said this will not necessarily mean that telecom operators will automatically kick off 5G establishments and services across the board, as the extremely high cost will be their largest concern, not to mention exorbitant prices of 5G smartphones to undermine the penetration of new-generation devices.

The fact that Microsoft’s market value outstripped Apple’s was a sign that software and system offerings count more than hardware devices.