Cortex A72
Cortex A72 is a high end core architecture which was publically announced couple of weeks back. These cores were expected to replace Cortex A57 cores in Snapdragon 800 series chipsets including the successors of Snapdragon 810. Cortex A57 offered 1.9 x boost as compared to Cortex A15 and Cortex A72 offers 3.5 times performance boost as compared to Cortex A15, along with better power efficiency.
Snapdragon 810 includes 4 Cortex A53 cores and 4 Cortex A57 cores, now Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 and 620 will have 4 cortex A53 cores at 1.2 GHz and 4 cortex A72 cores at 1.7 GHz and 1.8 GHz respectively. Snapdragon 618 will have 4 cortex A53 cores coupled with 2 Cortex A72 cores at 1.8 GHz. As you can see one cluster of Cortex A53 cores in Snapdragon 615 has been replaced with Cortex A72 cores. Recommended: Galaxy S6, The Next Samsung Flagship Phone will not use Snapdragon 810 Processor
MediaTek Pressure?
Looks like MediaTek pressure on Qualcomm is mounting up in mid range segment, where all smartphone action as shifted. MediaTek has launched low cost MT6732 and MT6752 to challenge Qualcomm’s 64 bit Snapdragon 410 and Snapdragon 415 respectively and Qualcomm is stepping up the came with new improved mid range SoC with powerful Cortex A72 cores. The new Snapdragon 600 series SoCs will bring dual channel memory (similar to Snapdragon 800 and 801), full HEVC hardware encoding and decoding (Snapdragon 810 feature) and new series of GPUs. Looks like MediaTek will be focusing more on Mid range SoCs rather than high end Snapdragon 800 series this year too.
Snapdragon 415 and Snapdragon 425
Both these SoC adds four extra Cortex A53 cores to Snapdragon 410, but the main highlight is much needed GPU replacement. These new SoCs will replace Adreno 305 with Adreno 406 GPU. Adreno 306 was a power efficient replacement for 32 bit Android 305, but with power efficiency some performance was compromised. The new Snapdragon 400 series chips also have a new, more efficient modem. All of these SoCs are expected to ship in consumer devices in the second half of 2015
