Chinese smartphone giant Xiaomi succeeds in developing the most advanced 3nm chip? As U.S. regulations continue to tighten, what is the importance of getting high-performance semiconductors on your own?
🟦 China’s Xiaomi’s success in developing 3nm chips?
Chinese smartphone giant Xiaomi has taped out its 3nm chips. This is a technology that greatly improves the performance and power saving of semiconductors, which can be said to be the heart of smartphones. Currently, many smartphones are equipped with Qualcomm’s “Snapdragon” in the United States, but the chip developed by Xiaomi this time is reported to have the same performance as Snapdragon.
However, there are only three companies in the world that can manufacture 3nm miniaturization technology: Taiwan’s TSMC, South Korea’s Samsung, and the United States’ Intel, and there are no companies in China that have this technology, so Xiaomi is also expected to need to outsource to overseas companies for mass production.
🟦 Why is Xiaomi’s challenge important?
Xiaomi’s development of 3nm chips is part of a strategy to give Chinese companies more autonomy to compete with U.S. regulations. Huawei has had difficulty procuring semiconductors due to export restrictions from the United States, which has reduced the competitiveness of smartphones. Against this backdrop, Xiaomi continues to invest in the development of high-performance chips, knowing the risk of failure.
In addition, as a past attempt by Xiaomi, the “Pengxi S1” announced in 2017 had technical challenges, such as the end of sales in a short period of time. However, since then, we have established specialized R&D bases in Shanghai and Beijing to promote persistent development.
🟦 Summary
Chinese smartphone giant Xiaomi succeeds in developing the most advanced 3nm chip? Xiaomi continues to invest in the development of high-performance chips as part of its strategy to increase its independence against U.S. regulations.
The fact that Xiaomi has reached the tape-out of its 3nm chips is different from the start of mass production, but if development proceeds at this pace, I feel that there is a high possibility that mass production will be realized in the near future.
