Sony Mobile has reporedly testing Mediatek's MT6589 quad-core processors for its mobile phones, in a move that could break Qualcomm's monopoly in the Sony Mobile supply chain.

Although Sony Mobile has not yet placed orders with MediaTek for the chips, the chip verification could be a milestone for the Taiwanese fabless house in the competition with world?s No.1 wireless chip vendor.

Mediatek has been mainly supplying its chips to Chinese smartphone makers ZTE, Lenovo and Huawei, as well as to Motorola, Sharp and Acer.

The world's top two smartphone suppliers - Apple and Samsung - are using their own chips, with Samsung to also use chips from Qualcomm and ST-Ericsson.

According to the the Taiwan-based China Economic News Service, industry experts estimate Mediatek to ship at least 200 million sets of smartphone chips in 2013, surging two folds from 2012.