In a move that could reshape the global semiconductor industry, China’s Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC) has reportedly pulled off 5nm chip production without using extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography.
Instead, SMIC achieved this using older deep ultraviolet (DUV) tools, paired with a highly complex process known as Self-Aligned Quadruple Patterning (SAQP). The breakthrough, detailed in a series of tweets by semiconductor analyst William Huo on X, isn’t just technical; it’s a bold geopolitical signal.
1. No EUV, No Problem
For years, the prevailing industry consensus was that EUV lithography, produced solely by Dutch company ASML, was indispensable for fabricating chips at 5nm and below. Without access to EUV systems due to export restrictions enforced by the U.S. and its allies, most analysts believed China’s chip ambitions would stall at the 7nm mark.
Instead, SMIC pushed forward using brute-force DUV techniques, squeezing every nanometer out of aging tools. According to Huo, this involved stacking multiple lithography and etching steps, specifically using SAQP, to mimic the precision of EUV. The method is slower, more error-prone, and expensive, but it works.
The result? A working 5nm-class chip, not yet in consumer devices but expected to arrive soon, potentially with the same market-shifting impact as the 7nm-based Kirin 9000S, which powered the Huawei Mate 60 and famously beat the iPhone 15 to offering satellite call support.
2. Frontline Fab, Not a Knockoff
The SMIC milestone also highlights China’s rapid progress in semiconductor tooling. Huo points to AMEC, now considered competitive with U.S.-based Lam Research in etching equipment, and NAURA, whose wafer cleaning tools rival those of Japan’s TEL. These firms were once seen as playing catch-up. Now they’re part of a parallel, self-reliant semiconductor supply chain.
“This isn’t just duplication,” Huo emphasized. “These are frontline fabs.” China is no longer imitating—it’s iterating on its own terms, with its own technology stack.
3. Sanctions Backfire, Huawei Surges
SMIC’s capabilities extend beyond smartphone chips. Huawei recently unveiled its Ascend 920 AI accelerator, reportedly manufactured on SMIC’s 6nm node. While SMIC remains cut off from EUV machines, it leveraged multi-patterning DUV lithography, possibly through its N+3 process, equivalent to 6nm, to produce this chip. The Ascend 920 delivers 900 TFLOPS of performance, a 30% to 40% jump over Huawei’s previous-gen 7nm Ascend 910C, along with 4 TB/s memory bandwidth.
Ironically, U.S. sanctions, specifically those restricting Nvidia’s H20 accelerator shipments to China, have boosted Huawei’s AI business. With Nvidia chips locked behind a strict export license system, many Chinese firms have turned to Huawei’s domestically produced alternatives, which require no such hurdles.
The very policy designed to kneecap Huawei has instead fueled its growth in the domestic AI market. SMIC’s advanced DUV nodes are the silent engine powering this shift.
4. The Road Ahead: 3nm with DUV?
Every chip SMIC ships under sanctions is a statement of resilience. It proves that cutting China off from EUV didn’t stop progress, it redirected it. While DUV-based 5nm chips may not match the raw performance of TSMC or Samsung’s latest EUV-made nodes, they’re already “good enough” for most modern workloads, including AI, 5G, and high-performance consumer electronics.
There are already whispers that SMIC is experimenting with an even more extreme technique, Self-Aligned Octuple Patterning (SAOP), to push DUV down to 3nm territory. It sounds improbable, but in a world where elegance is increasingly a luxury, China is betting on sheer execution.
If successful, it could permanently redefine assumptions around lithography, tool dependencies, and the geopolitical control of chip supply chains.
5. Moore’s Law, Rewritten
“Moore’s Law didn’t die,” Huo wrote. “It moved to Shanghai.” Instead of giving up, China is grinding its way forward, layer by layer, pixel by pixel. The future of chips may no longer be written by who holds the best tools, but by who refuses to stop building.
The rules are changing. And DUV just lit the fuse.
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