Transfer of centre of gravity to national components
Huawei Technologies is increasingly acquiring components for its smartphones in China. The demolishing of the Mate 60 Pro smartphone, which entered the marketplace a fewer months ago, showed that in 47% it was constructed on the basis of Chinese parts (in terms of their value), which means an increase of 90% compared to the model surveyed for this angle 3 years ago.
The Nikkei Agency, together with Fomalhaut Techno Solutions, dismantled the Huawei Mate 60 Pro smartphone to analyse the cost of components utilized in its production. Mate 60 Pro entered the Chinese marketplace in August that year. During the study, the maker of each component was identified and the share of the full cost was calculated by country of origin of the individual producers.
The survey has shown that China has made fast technological progress, especially in the field of semiconductors based on 7-nanometer production technology, and this acceleration is straight related to the US's introduction in 2019 to tighten export restrictions on state-of-the-art equipment and software, aimed at Chinese companies, primarily at Huawei.
Fomalhaut estimates the full cost of Huawei Mate 60 Pro components is $422. With respect to participation by country, China ranks first with 47%. The share of Chinese suppliers of home production components thus increased by 90 percent compared to the previously valued Mate 40 Pro put on the marketplace in autumn 2020, erstwhile the effects of US sanctions were inactive limited.
The increase in the share of Chinese components in the cost of production of the latest camera is mostly due to the fact that Huawei changed the OLED panel supplier – the most costly telephone component – from the South Korean LG Display to the BOE Technology Group.
BOE gains the marketplace advantage of smartphone displays dominated by LG and Samsung Electronics, for quality reasons, but lags behind in large-scale production capacity.
“The question is to what degree [BOE] will be able to accommodate Huawei’s request erstwhile its volume of production and sales returns to earlier levels”, said Fomalhaut CEO, Minatake Kashio.
The contact screen components for Mate 40 Pro were provided by the American Synaptics developer, but in Mate 60 Pro Huawei utilized Chinese parts. The value of Chinese components for Mate 60 Pro was $198.
After the release of Mate 60 Pro, it turned out that the camera is compatible with the 5G wireless communication standard and that its heart is simply a Chinese processor created on the basis of 7 nm technology. Both were to be inaccessible for Huawei for years, which was served by US sanctions against Huawei. Since specified semiconductor components were previously produced exclusively by the main chip producers in Taiwan, South Korea and the USA, it was assumed that Chinese companies would be recovering technological losses to competition for years (10-15 years). Moreover, during this time they will be forced to give way to abroad markets.
The 5-nanometer processor utilized in Mate 40 Pro was designed by a subsidiary of Huawei, HiSilicon Technologies, but its production was commissioned by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC).
Based on the analysis of parts in the undressed copies of the fresh smartphone Huawei experts Fomalhaut concluded that Mate 60 Pro uses a 7 nm chip designed by HiSilicon and manufactured by China's Semiconductor Manufacturing global Corp.
SMIC is believed to have utilized older equipment, not covered by US export regulations for semiconductor lithography, a key phase in the production process.
“By applying light multiple times, somewhat shifting the position of the substrate, you can make circuits equivalent to 7 nm products on silicon substrate, even with older equipment,” said Minatake Kashio, CEO of Fomalhaut Techno Solutions, a investigation company that carried out a teradic analysis of the smartphone Huawei Mate 60 Pro.
It wasn't expected to be like this, which is Chinese chips 7 nm.
Apple was the first company to equip its iPhone smartphones with 7 nm chips in 2018. It turns out that China has caught up with technology at a much faster pace than expected.
It is amazing that China, capable of producing 14 nm processors alone at most, has caught up with specified a large technological backlog in a fewer years.
The stripping of the telephone showed that Chinese electronic component companies are rapidly gaining importance and are increasingly serious competition for producers from another countries.
One of the most amazing discoveries is that Mate 60 Pro uses Chinese chip 7 nm. The 7 nm semiconductors are the most modern chips in the marketplace and are a key component in the improvement of 5G and another next generation technologies.
That's not how it's expected to be, which is who gets it, who gets it, who loses it.
The fact that China is able to produce 7 nm chips shows that the country has made crucial technological advancement in a very short, much shorter period than expected. China is expected to play an increasingly crucial function in the global semiconductor marketplace in the coming years.
The share of nipponese components in Mate 60 Pro fell from 19% to 1%. Huawei changed camera image sensor supplier from Sony Group to Samsung. The share of Korean components in Mate 60 Pro was 36%.
Overall, the demolishment of Huawei Mate 60 Pro shows that China is rapidly becoming a leader in smartphone technology. Chinese electronics companies are gaining importance, and this country is able to produce the most modern chips on the market.
The American Nvidia company reported a three-fold increase in gross from the sale of chips for AI solutions (artificial intelligence). At the same time, he reported a sharp drop in sales on the most crucial marketplace in China.
Source: Nikkei Asia
Leszek B. Glass
Email: [email protected]
© www.chiny24.com
