Has Biden/Blinken made a secret deal w CCP or is this conspiracy?
From @lidangzzz “To reiterate, all current claims in the market regarding Huawei's Kirin 9000S being outsourced are entirely incorrect.
The real situation aligns with my analysis and summary from last week:
- The Kirin 9000S is indeed manufactured by SMIC (Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation), and in February of this year, it obtained a license from the U.S. Department of Commerce, making it a legitimate and open collaboration with Huawei.
- Huawei's acquisition of this license was part of a larger package of prerequisites for Blinken's visit to China. The Biden administration was eager to engage in dialogue with China to alleviate tensions arising from various incidents, including the Huawei case. Therefore, they agreed to China's proposed conditions, including the requirement for SMIC to obtain a U.S. Department of Commerce license for manufacturing Kirin chips for Huawei.
- SMIC already possesses a relatively mature N+2 process technology, close to 7nm. However, its yield rates are low. Previously, they had manufactured mining machines for a certain domestic company, using core equipment from ASML, the Dutch manufacturer of DUV (Deep Ultraviolet) lithography machines, model 1980i. Therefore, SMIC could only legally manufacture for entities on the U.S. entity list, such as Huawei, after receiving the necessary licenses from the U.S.
With approval from the White House and the Department of Commerce, they began ramping up production of Kirin 9000S chips for Huawei from February this year. However, Blinken's visit to China has been repeatedly postponed and met with a less than respectful reception as the "Secretary of State's visit."
- Currently, SMIC is subject to a long-term U.S. embargo on EUV (Extreme Ultraviolet) lithography machines. As a result, the N+2 process, which is roughly equivalent to 7nm, represents the limit for SMIC and other mainland Chinese chip foundries in the short term.
Due to its inability to procure the latest IP core from ARM, Huawei cannot overcome the performance and design bottlenecks for the Kirin 9000S in the short term. Improvements in performance and power efficiency through process enhancements are also unattainable.
In essence, without the removal of other sanctions, the Kirin 9000S has already reached its performance limits, and subsequent generations of products are unlikely to achieve significant leaps or improvements.
- The license obtained by SMIC for manufacturing on behalf of Huawei is part of an internal agreement between the U.S. Department of Commerce, SMIC, and Huawei. This agreement has not been publicly disclosed, and as a result, mainstream media outlets worldwide have no access to any information or documentation that would confirm the points I've made above.
My views are entirely based on my own analysis and that of my WeChat group colleagues, with no concrete evidence. They are all inferences and deductions. However, at present, there are almost no other plausible scenarios or surprises, which gives me a high degree of confidence in the points mentioned above.”
