Huawei has no choice but to design 3nm chips, but no foundry dares to connect 14nm chips
According to the agency's data, by the March 2022 quarter, Huawei's Kirin chip market share has increased from 04% becomes 0, which means that the inventory of Huawei Kirin chips has been depleted.
In fact, everyone knows that from the perspective of the new machines on the market, there is no Huawei Kirin chip, and all the new machines that Huawei has listed use Qualcomm's 4G chip.
Behind this, there is actually a powerless fact, that is, Huawei has the ability to design 3nm chips, but even if it comes up with 14nm chips, it can't find a factory to help it OEM.
Therefore, its most advanced chips can only stay on the design drawings, and it cannot be mass-produced for its own mobile phones at all, otherwise why not be afraid of the ban, how can the 5G leader only allow the launch of 4G mobile phones and let others see jokes?
Huawei's design level is on par with Qualcomm and Apple, and no one doubts that Huawei has successfully competed with Qualcomm, Apple and other mobile phone SoC manufacturers starting with the Kirin 970 chip.
The 5nm chip launched in 2020 - Kirin 9000 chip is the pinnacle, although it is not as good as the Apple A chip in the same period, not inferior to the Qualcomm chip in the same period, and not inferior to any Android chip in the same period.
Therefore, now that Huawei has the ability to design 3nm chips, we do not need to doubt it.
However, in order to help Huawei OEM chips, the factory also has many restrictions. According to the requirements of the long-arm jurisdiction of the United States, if you want to help Huawei OEM chips, you must obtain a license issued by the United States, otherwise you cannot use American technology.
At present, it is basically impossible for these factories to obtain American licenses, so this road is basically interrupted, and there is only one option, that is, not to use American technology (equipment).
However, at present, it is impossible for any factory not to use American technology (equipment) in the 14nm process, on the one hand, because of the limitation of lithography technology, and on the other hand, there are limitations in equipment, EDA, etc.
So we see that TSMC, Samsung, and even SMIC no longer help Huawei produce Kirin foundry chips, and SMIC no longer helps Huawei produce Kirin 710A foundry 14nm chips.
According to industry experts, the current production line can beautify up to 28 nanometers, but the foundry will no longer help Huawei OEM, and then obtain such a beautification production line.
First of all, from the point of view of the input-output ratio, this is not profitable;Secondly, because other advanced processes are dependent on American technology (equipment), they will not do it, thereby offending the United States.
So the current fact is that Huawei has the ability to design 3nm wafers, but even if it can manufacture 14nm wafers, it can't find foundries, so Kirin and Kunpeng have destroyed those advanced wafers, and they can find foundries, which are relatively mature wafers.
Therefore, only if there is a breakthrough in the domestic ** chain, and the foundry can no longer rely on American technology and equipment, Kirin's wafers can come back, or the ban will be lifted, which one do you think will come first?