New Huawei Kirin could be a big milestone for Chinese smartphone industry

Huawei is taking small steps in the Kirin chip field, but these moves may strengthen the Chinese smartphone industry in the future. With a new processor, the tech giant could unlock new and huge achievements for its smartphone business.

The story of Kirin’s rebirth is quite famous among Chinese consumers. It started when HiSilicon – Huawei’s semiconductor subsidiary used to make Kirin chips using third-party equipment. These machines usually belonged to U.S. suppliers like TSMC.

Everything was fine until the U.S. sanctions banged Huawei and accused it of being a major security threat to foreign nations. Under the Trump era, this ban restricted Huawei and other Chinese firms from selling or purchasing any U.S.-based tech.

These challenges severely affected Kirin chip production. Huawei was unable to develop more power-efficient chips due to a lack of effective chipmaking tools.

Support from Qualcomm

As a result, the OEM limited the Kirin chip supply and said that it may no longer develop new chips following the U.S. sanction. Hereafter, the tech giant started taking help from chipmakers like Qualcomm and Intel for its smartphones and laptops.

Being a blacklisted company, Qualcomm wasn’t allowed to ship highly-efficient processors to China. Thus, the tech giant had to settle with good but less effective chipsets to maintain its position in the Chinese and global smartphone market.

Huawei Kirin 980 chipset (Image Credits: Huawei)

Over time, Huawei acknowledged that the absence of Kirin chips slowed down its smartphone business. The company dropped to the lowest in the consumer market for most of its smart products including phones, tablets, notebooks, and more.

Turning Point…

After fighting for three and a half years, Huawei reignited the Kirin chip with the Mate 60 series. The company launched its flagship product last year (August 2023), which resulted in a high-fy sales with long queues in front of every Huawei offline store.

Mate 60 Pro brought instant progress in Huawei’s smartphone business. The premium phone equipped with a new Kirin 9000s 7nm chip not only breathed new life into the company’s conditions but also into the Chinese smartphone industry.

Huawei Mate 60 Pro (Image Credits: Huawei)

Inputs revealed that Huawei joined hands with SMIC – a Chinese chip foundry for its self-developed processors. The chipmaker used DUV and certain outdated equipment for making Kirin chips. After Mate 60, the company introduced several Kirin 9000 derivatives and other new chips like Kirin 9010 for Pura 70 Ultra.

During an interrogation, Qualcomm said that Huawei doesn’t require its chips anymore. It’s because the company has developed its own chip and plans to expand its production.

That implies the Chinese tech giant may also soon end its dependency on Intel for notebooks with its self-developed Kirin PC chip that has been in rumors for a long.

Huawei has further increased investment in the R&D field. The OEM has recently opened a new giant research and development center worth $1.4 billion in Shanghai to attract foreign scientists and talented youth to boost its chipset manufacturing.

Mate 70 series: 5nm or 7nm?

The company’s next stop is the Mate 70 flagship. Huawei is in rumors to unveil the premium lineup with a 5nm Kirin chipset. But things didn’t reach the confirmation page yet. Hence, it’s still unclear if Mate 70 will use a 5nm or 7nm process tech.

Although we can say that Huawei is working on a new Kirin processor which will be many times more efficient than its predecessors. It is also said to use upgraded AI capabilities with a significant reduction in power consumption for efficient performance.

Thus, the upcoming Kirin chipset with the Huawei Mate 70 flagship series may unlock a huge milestone for the Chinese smartphone industry.