Tech war: Huawei’s stealth chip production plan becomes a guessing game for industry insiders as US sanctions keep it hemmed in
- Huawei’s in-house chip design unit HiSilicon has the ability to design advanced chips but it is a different undertaking to fabricate chips
- Huawei’s once-lucrative smartphone business has been hobbled by US trade sanctions that have cut off its access to advanced chips
The chip production plans of Huawei Technologies Co have become the subject of fresh speculation within the semiconductor industry after the tech giant filed a patent application for advanced lithography late last year, a key technology used to produce cutting-edge chips.
Many analysts say the odds that Huawei, whose once-lucrative smartphone business has been hobbled by US trade sanctions that have cut off its access to advanced chips, can build a US-free chip production line are small.
While Huawei’s in-house chip design unit HiSilicon has the ability to design advanced chips, it is a completely different undertaking to fabricate chips at high scale.
For example, China’s top chip maker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp is only able to produce 14-nanometre node chips at scale – well behind the cutting edge of industry leader Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company.
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Nevertheless, speculation about Huawei’s chipmaking efforts has continued to flow ever since the firm was barred by US sanctions from procuring the services of foundries that use US-origin technologies to fabricate its chip designs.