As Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo was visiting China earlier this week, a sea-green Chinese smartphone was quietly launched online.
It was no normal gadget. And its launch has sparked hushed concern in Washington that U.S. sanctions have failed to prevent China from making a key technological advance. Such a development would seem to fulfill warnings from U.S. chipmakers that sanctions wouldn’t stop China, but would spur it to redouble efforts to build alternatives to U.S. technology.
I’m not sure why this is surprising or even notable, they’ve been using this 7 nm process since last year.
Just an opportunity to highlight it again, I guess.
China having access to 7nm fabs is extremely worrying.
Why? I’m not super educated on this matter and can’t find anything clear on why this would be bad
Because it’s a sign they were able to get that manufacturing technology working. It means their equipment is better than it was up until very recently, and they were able to work out the kinks (mainly optics, iirc) stopping them from using ‘7nm’ nodes. It also means that the west is loosing the semiconductor production advantage it has.
Check out Asianometry, he does good videos on semiconductor manufacture, and I believe he did a video or two on China as well.
oh no china make good tech? why is it worrying for me?
The answer rather depends on where you live.
Yeah I have literally zero more information lol I’m in the US and feel like I should be concerned because “China” but I’d love a valid reason beyond “they’re now capable of sustaining they’re own technology”.
That still doesn’t tell me why I should be concerned. Another country having access to good technology doesn’t set off alarm bells for me. I guess I need someone to spell out why them being less reliant on the West for tech is concerning. Especially considering how true the opposite has been (in regards to manufacturing) for ages.
The issue arises when you look at it from a geopolitics point of view. The US (aka the West) loosing manufacturing and design dominance in the semiconductor space means that there is less bargaining power to force others to do what the US wants. In the case of China, US export embargos for cutting edge semiconductor technology was meant to cripple China’s technological progress, especially in the semiconductor design/production and AI model space. (Think of whatever shenanigans US companies have been doing with AI models, and what China has already demonstrated on Western hardware.)
Semiconductors are integral to modern weapon systems. If you’ve been keeping up with the news, you’ll remember that even Russian missiles have been found to contain western-made electronics. AKA Russia has been buying US technology and adding it into their own weapon systems, rather than designing, producing and using their own. That makes Russia reliant on having a stable source of US components, be it imported legally or in spite of sanctions. The same goes for China. The fear is that China will eventually be able to manufacture weapon electronics comparable to US designs. Stealing the designs from US sources isn’t particularly difficult, its always been the manufacture of said components that caused issues for China. Seemingly, that gap has been closing.
In short it’s basically the issue of the West having made China the factory of the world, them having learned/being able to steal designs, and them now having the ability to produce almost anything. That makes them a strategic threat to US interests.
Anything that makes someone less reliant on you is a net negative if you wish to remain ‘in charge’.
The less economic and tech dependencies China has on the West, the more free they are to act on their own accord.
The US is concerned about Taiwan-- they wrote a blank cheque of support because it was a DeMoCrAcY back when China was a far weaker economy and military, and it will now be very difficult and expensive to stop reunification. Using TSMC as a shield is no doubt part of policy-- “invade and we blow the tech world back to 2010” is a viable threat until other countries get 7/5/3nm.
But their fear is more general; they are losing their economic and geopolitical dominance, and one of their big bulwarks-- advanced tech-- is giving way. They’re trying to hype up the fear and concern. Expect a lot more sabre rattling by the West.
Any details on the phone?
deleted by creator
🤖 I’m a bot that provides automatic summaries for articles:
Click here to see the summary
“The major geopolitical significance,” he said, “has been to show that it is possible to completely design [without] U.S. technology and still produce a product that may not be quite as good as cutting edge Western models, but is still quite capable.”
China’s official broadcaster, CGTN, in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, called the phone Huawei’s “first higher-end processor” since U.S. sanctions were imposed and said the chip it contains was made by Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., a company partially owned by the Chinese government.
U.S. sanctions were intended to slow China’s progress in emerging fields like artificial intelligence and big data by cutting off its ability to buy or build advanced semiconductors, which are the brains of these systems.
“This shows that Chinese companies like Huawei still have plenty of capability to innovate,” said Chris Miller, a professor at Tufts University and author of the book “Chip War.” “I think it will also probably intensify debate in Washington on whether restrictions are to be tightened.”
“This development will almost certainly prompt much stronger calls for further tightening of export control licensing for U.S. suppliers of Huawei, who continue to be able to ship commodity semiconductors that are not used for 5G applications,” Triolo said.
For instance, Intel recently announced it will have to pay $353 million in termination fees to Israel’s Tower Semiconductor after failing to acquire Chinese regulatory approval for the acquisition.
Saved 84% of original text.
