HiSilicon, Explained: China's Leading Fabless Semiconductor Maker

When TSMC began producing chips with its latest 5 nanometer process in the middle of 2020, the flagship customer who would receive the majority of those chips was Apple. Apple was fabbing its cutting edge A14 Bionic and M1 chips. They continue to receive shipments to this day as TSMC’s single biggest customer.

But there was another smartphone chip company utilizing TSMC's 5nm lines. Alongside the A14 Bionic was the Kirin 9000, a chip made by a fabless company known as HiSilicon (海思).

For several short months, TSMC delivered Kirin 9000 chips to HiSilicon. But there was a looming deadline. On the 15th of September 2020, TSMC would have to apply to the Trump Administration for licenses to use American technology to keep supplying HiSilicon. And that is because HiSilicon is the fabless chip design arm of Huawei.

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