Last year, Huawei was faced with an enormous task of finding a replacement for Google Apps. Its solution was to develop Huawei Mobile Services and investing in its AppGallery app store. But next year, Huawei will face an even bigger challenge – chipsets. With TSMC barred from manufacturing chips for Huawei’s chip subsidiary – Hisilicon, the company will be forced to look for alternatives very soon.
According to an industry insider on Weibo, Huawei’s flagship smartphones in 2021 could be powered by a 5nm chip from a third party vendor. The insider didn’t expand on his comment but the most likely contender for Huawei’s chip supply should be none other than MediaTek.
This comment by the insider is a bit confusing especially if you have been reading reports about the 5nm Kirin 1000 or 1020 that’s all set to launch this year. But here, he’s talking about 5nm chips for Huawei’s 2021 flagships and not the upcoming Mate 40.
TSMC Can Still Supply Chips To Huawei Until September 2020
In May 2020, the Trump administration added a new rule which barred overseas companies from supplying components to Huawei if it was made using US technology. Given how US equipment plays an important role in manufacturing semiconductor chips, this technically bars TSMC, SMIC, and even Samsung from manufacturing chips for Huawei. However, the US has granted a grace period of 120-days before the rule takes into effect. So TSMC can continue supplying chips to Hisilicon until September 15, 2020.
There was also a recent report which said that Huawei has placed an urgent order with the TSMC for 5nm chips. This means Huawei’s upcoming Kirin 1000 or 1020 (name is yet to be confirmed) 5nm chipset can still be manufactured by TSMC and released on schedule.
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But What About Huawei’s 2021 flagships?
Unless the US government extends the grace period after September, TSMC, or for that matter even the Chinese SMIC cannot manufacture chips for Hisilicon. This would leave Huawei with very limited options. An alternative could be to procure 5nm chips from a third-party vendor so that Huawei’s flagships next year are competitive, even without its own Hisilicon chips.
Since Qualcomm is a US company, it’s not a viable alternative. This leaves either MediaTek or even Samsung as the potential vendor of next-generation 5nm chips for Huawei.
But it remains to be seen if Samsung or MediaTek can legally sell its own chips to Huawei that’s manufactured using US technology. There are reports which say TSMC and Samsung are looking at setting up production lines without US equipment but we haven’t heard anything concrete yet.
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