As Huawei looks towards more advanced semiconductors, speculation swirls on how far it can push existing chip-making gear

A Huawei patent has raised questions about how far it can push existing DUV chip-making equipment using a technique to help it advance despite US sanctions

Huawei’s 7-nm chips in its Mate 60 and Pura 70 smartphones has resulted in closer scrutiny of the sanctioned firm’s advances in semiconductors

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Huawei’s Kirin 9000s processor used in the Mate 60 Pro has led to close scrutiny of how the sanctioned company is advancing its chip designs without access to the most cutting-edge equipment. Photo: Huawei Technologies

Published: 9:00am, 5 Jun 2024Updated: 10:01am, 5 Jun 2024

Speculation is swirling about how far US-sanctioned Huawei Technologies can push its latest chip-making techniques to keep up with the cutting-edge designs enabled by the extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) machines it is unable to use, 10 months after shocking the world with a 7-nanometre-grade processor.

The Shenzhen-based telecommunications equipment giant has kept its cards close to its chest regarding its chip-making capabilities together with Semiconductor International Manufacturing Corp (SMIC). The company has never confirmed how it made the chip that powered its Mate 60 Pro last year, but the company is now turning towards a technique called self-aligned quadruple patterning (SAQP) that could help it advance even further.

Questions are now being raised about just how far that process, which relies on existing chip-making equipment in China, can be pushed while Huawei tries to cool speculation.

It was a Huawei patent application made public by China’s national intellectual property regulator in March, but filed in September 2021, that initially sparked debate about how far Huawei and SMIC could go into advanced chip-making below the 14-nm threshold set by US export controls.

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The patent outlines a method of using SAQP to “increase the design freedom of circuit patterns”, which is similar to a patent granted in December to SiCarrier, a state-backed chip tool developer related to Huawei. SiCarier’s patent describes a way of producing chips on a 5-nm process node using deep ultraviolet lithography (DUV) tools, the Post reported in April. DUV is less advanced than EUV, but China has been stockpiling equipment since last year to deal with more stringent export restrictions.

One Huawei executive tried to cool off speculation about its chip-making capabilities in April. Huawei Cloud CEO Zhang Pingan said at a conference hosted by China Mobile that the company will focus on chip architecture instead of processing grades.