The U.S. trade sanctions on Huawei pretty much mean the latter is fighting an uphill battle with other chipmakers, as it lacks access to the latest and greatest in EUV equipment. Fortunately, a new report states that later this year, when the Mate 90 series materializes, the former Chinese giant will finally show to the world that its use of DUV machinery is sufficient to mass produce competitive chipsets, with the upcoming Kirin SoC said to match TSMC’s 3nm process.
Unproven LogicFolding could carve out Huawei’s future, but previous Kirin SoCs were also similarly hyped
Both SMIC and Huawei have been mum about mass producing Kirin chipsets on the 5nm process, with earlier investigations surrounding the Kirin 9030 Pro showing that these companies are limited to the 7nm node due to the lack of EUV paraphernalia at their disposal. Fortunately, this major obstacle is no longer a barrier, as Huawei previously announced its LogicFolding architecture.
In the absence of advanced EUV machinery, Huawei has had to resort to a ton of creativity, with its LogicFolding technology aiming to increase transistor density by every generation, to the point where its Kirin SoC would eventually be able to hit stable clock speeds of 5.00GHz. While there’s no evidence that the silicon in the Mate 90 family can reach this milestone, a report on Kipost appears to imply that Huawei’s packaging technology is equivalent to TSMC’s 3nm process.
While witnessing competition in the chip industry is always a welcome sight, it shouldn’t be practiced to a degree where the product is overhyped but underwhelms in performance and efficiency. For instance, news surrounding SMIC’s 5nm technology hinted that China’s semiconductor landscape was staging a comeback after the Kirin 9000S’ inception. Unfortunately, that momentum crashed and burned because, even after three years, Huawei has stuck with SMIC’s 7nm process.
However, the report mentions that the company’s Mate 90 launch is said to happen around the same time as Apple’s iPhone 18, which may highlight Huawei’s growing confidence in both its chip and smartphone hardware prowess. However, the company’s primary market remains China, and with the region lacking Google services, the Mate 90 range will unsurprisingly gain popularity.
The real test for Huawei will happen in a few months
Huawei not only has to prove that its upcoming Kirin SoC, developed using the LogicFolding architecture, has actual merit, but it needs to accomplish this Herculean task while competing with the iPhone 18. We’ve already reported that the iPhone 17’s competitive pricing and feature-rich package have resulted in millions of activations in China, showing that consumers care more about the value than local brand sentiment.
For Huawei to retain an even playing field with Apple, its Mate 90 family will have to be just as feature-rich, or it’ll continue to risk losing market share in the only country where its presence is relevant.
News Source: Kipost
About the author: Omar Sohail is a reporter and analyst for Wccftech's mobile section, specializing in the technology and business of the mobile industry. His expertise lies in the intricate hardware supply chain, covering developments in semiconductor manufacturing, chip lithography, and camera sensor technology.
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