According to Radio France Internationale (RFI) Chinese Edition, a recent report from the Center for Strategic and International Research (CSIS) stated that China’s Huawei used shell companies to obtain more than 2 million TSMC-manufactured AI chips and to stockpile enough high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips to last for more than a year.
Huawei placed an order from Taiwan’s TSMC through a shell company to mass produce Huawei’s Ascend 910B processor AI chips and ship them to China, violating US export controls. According to internal Huawei assessments, the HBMs it stocked can meet the needs of a full year of production, most of which were purchased from Samsung before the U.S. ban took effect last December, possibly through a shell company as well.
China’s SMIC, Huawei’s AI chip manufacturing partner, has had issues with low yields of about 20 percent it its own attempts at manufacturing AI chips. Its 7-nanometer process technology had a monthly output of 20,000 pieces, with low yields partly resulting from export controls imposed by the United States and its allies. In the AI competition, American companies are still ahead of China, but the gap has narrowed significantly.
Source: RFI Chinese, March 8, 2025
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