China’s Pivot: Tech Giants Seek Self-Sufficiency Amid US Chip Ban

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The US ban on Chinese industries has left China struggling with a seemingly severe shortage of chips. However, China’s tech giants refuse to surrender; instead, they’re pivoting quickly to survive the game.

Since 2019, the US Department of Commerce has added Chinese leading companies like Huawei to its entity list. Restrictions were expanded in 2020 to include semiconductor manufacturing, making a huge impact on SMIC’s advanced processes below 14nm.

Starting in 2021, the US has been intensifying its control by placing more IC design houses on the list, which include Jingjia (GPU), Shenwei (CPU), Loongson Tech (CPU), Cambricon (AI), Wayzim (RF&GPS), and Yangtze (NAND Flash). Furthermore, the export of advanced EDA tools, equipment, CPUs, and GPUs to China has also been banned.

The goal of such measures is to hinder China’s progress in high-tech fields such as 5G/6G, AI, Cloud computing, and autonomous driving by eroding the dominance of its tech giants over time.

China has been aggressively pursuing a policy of domestic substitution in response to the US’s increasing control. As part of this effort, leading domestic IC design companies like Horizon, Cambricon, Enflame, Biren, Gigadevice, and Nations Technologies have been ramping up their efforts for comprehensive chip upgrades in a variety of applications.

Chinese Brands Ramping up for ASICs

There is a particularly intriguing phenomenon in recent years. Since 2019, China’s leading brands have been venturing into chip design to develop highly specialized ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuits) at an unprecedented speed. This move is aimed at ensuring a stable supply of chips and also advancing their technical development.

A closer look at how top companies across diverse application fields integrate ASIC chips into their technology roadmap:

• AI Cloud computing: Alibaba, Baidu, Tencent

China’s tech giants are leveraging advanced foundry processes, such as TSMC’s 5nm and Samsung’s 7nm, to produce cutting-edge AI chips for high-end applications like cloud computing, image coding, AI computing, and network chips.

Alibaba launched its AI chip, Hanguang 800, and server CPU, Yitian 710, in 2019 and 2021, respectively. Both chips were manufactured at TSMC’s 5nm process and are extensively used on Alibaba’s cloud computing platform.

In December 2019, Baidu released its AI chip, Kunlun Xin, which uses Samsung’s 14nm process, followed by its 2nd generation, which uses a 7nm process, for AI and image coding.

• Smartphone: Xiaomi, Vivo, OPPO

Due to the high technical threshold of SoC technology used in smartphones, mobile phone brands mainly develop their own chips by optimizing image, audio, and power processing.

In the year of 2021, Xiaomi released the ISP Surge C1, followed by the PMIC Surge P1. Vivo first released the ISP V1 in September 2021, followed by an upgraded product, V1+, in April 2022, and then V2 in November 2022.
OPPO, on the other hand, unveiled the MariSilicon X NPU in December 2021, which enhances the image processing performance of smartphones, using TSMC’s 6nm process, and later revealed the MariSilicon Y Bluetooth audio SoC TSMC’s 6nm RF process later in 2022.

• Home appliance: Konka, Midea, Changhong, Skyworth

The brands are focusing primarily on MCU and PMIC chips that are essential to a wide range of home appliances. They’re also incorporating SoC chips into their smart TVs.

For example, Hisense has jumped into the SoC game in January 2022 by releasing an 8K AI image chip for their smart TVs. Changhong manufactured an MCU with RISC-V architecture and a 40nm process in December 2022.

• Autonomous driving: NIO, Xiaopeng, Li Auto, BYD

The leading companies are developing ISP and highly technical SoC chips for autonomous driving, which has resulted in a slower development process.

In 2020, NIO formed a semiconductor design team for Autonomous driving chips and ISP. Xiaopeng started its Autonomous driving and ISP chip R&D project in the first half of 2021. Li Auto established two subsidiaries in 2022, with a primary focus on power semiconductors and ISP chips.

Finally, BYD, which has a long history of working on MCU and power semiconductor components, also announced its entry into the autonomous driving chip market in 2022.

Navigating the US’ Tech Crackdown

So why are these brands investing so heavily in self-developed ASICs?

One reason is to avoid the risks associated with export control policies from the US and its allies. Developing their own chips would mitigate the risk of supply chain disruptions caused by potential blockades, ensuring a stable supply and the sustainability of their technology roadmap.

In addition, there are many internal incentives for these brands – for instance, companies that have self-developed chips will be eligible for more government subsidies, as this aligns with the government’s aggressive policy to foster the semiconductor industry. Brands can also reduce their reliance on external suppliers by using their own ASIC chips, which can further lower the operating costs.

Technology wise, ASIC chips allow brands to enhance the features they require and enable better integration with the software, which could provide efficiency gains at system level – similar strategies are also being employed by Google and AWS with their AI chips, as well as by Apple with its M1 SoC.

With all things considered, it is certainly possible that we will see a persistent trend of more self-developed ASIC chips made by Chinese brands, which could potentially lead to significant changes in China’s semiconductor supply chain from the ground up.