Well, if this isn't a statement of intent, we don't know what is. Those good old market sources are reporting today that Qualcomm has set aside a cool $2 billion to build a new
Mirasol display production plant in Taiwan. The chipmaker already has a Mirasol facility in Longtan, a joint venture with Foxlink, but is said to be the sole investor in this new build. The whole thing has apparently been spurred on by a major client having "already started the design-in process" after seeing production samples of the
5.7-inch, low power, color display. We can't know for sure who that client may be, but Qualcomm's been doing some real
heavy flirting with Amazon and all those overtures might (
might!) finally have paid off. Of couse, as
Jeff Bezos himself said, a color Kindle isn't likely to hit the market anytime soon, and this new factory isn't expected to begin volume production until 2012, but we'll take a slow and speculative roadmap over no roadmap at all.