{"id":544690,"date":"2026-03-16T20:04:26","date_gmt":"2026-03-16T20:04:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/544690\/"},"modified":"2026-03-16T20:04:26","modified_gmt":"2026-03-16T20:04:26","slug":"exclusive-chinas-no-2-chipmaker-readies-7-nm-production-as-beijing-ramps-up-self-sufficiency-drive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/544690\/","title":{"rendered":"Exclusive-China\u2019s No. 2 chipmaker readies 7 nm production as Beijing ramps up self-sufficiency drive"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

SINGAPORE, March 16 (Reuters) – China’s Hua Hong Group has developed advanced chip manufacturing technologies that can be used to produce artificial intelligence<\/a> chips, four people familiar with the matter said, a major milestone in Beijing’s efforts to boost \u200ctech self-sufficiency.<\/p>\n

The group’s contract chipmaking business, Huali Microelectronics, is readying a 7-nanometre (nm) chipmaking process at its plant in Shanghai, the \u200cpeople said, which would make it the second Chinese chipmaker with such advanced technologies. Hua Hong is China’s second-largest chipmaker.<\/p>\n

China’s largest contract chipmaker, SMIC, is at present the \u200bonly domestic producer capable of making chips with 7 nm technologies.<\/p>\n

The development comes after Washington eased some of its tech export controls since last year, allowing Nvidia<\/a> to sell its second-most-powerful AI chips to China.<\/p>\n

Despite the easing, Beijing has encouraged domestic firms to purchase homegrown alternatives, as it seeks to wean itself off foreign suppliers.<\/p>\n

Reuters could not determine how Hua Hong achieved the advanced manufacturing capability, its manufacturing efficiency, and which major equipment \u200csuppliers were involved in the development. Hua Hong’s \u2060development of a 7 nm chipmaking process has not been previously reported.<\/p>\n

But Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies has been in collaboration with the chipmaker for the 7 nm technologies, three of the sources said. All \u2060of the sources declined to be named, because the information is not meant to be public.<\/p>\n

Hua Hong Group, Huali, its sister company Hua Hong Semiconductor and Huawei did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n

Shares in Hua Hong Semiconductor surged 12% on Monday after the Reuters report.<\/p>\n

SMIC uses Dutch chip equipment \u200bmaker ASML’s \u200bimmersion machines to make 7 nm chips, but production yields – the number \u200bof good chips made per silicon wafer – have remained \u200cweak, analysts have said.<\/p>\n

ASML said it does not comment on questions related to deliveries.<\/p>\n

TEST PRODUCTION UNDERWAY<\/p>\n

Huali’s research and development on 7 nm chips at its Hua Hong Fab 6 began last year, with support from domestic equipment suppliers including Huawei-backed SiCarrier, which tested its equipment at a facility in Shenzhen last year, a separate source said. SiCarrier did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

The development followed an announcement by Hua Hong Semiconductor in December that it planned to acquire a controlling stake in Huali and raise a further 7.56 billion yuan ($1.10 billion) \u200cto fund technological upgrades and research at the foundry.<\/p>\n

Huali is planning initial \u200b7 nm chip production capacity of a few thousand wafers per month by the \u200bend of the year, with a goal to ramp up \u200bmore later, two of the sources said.<\/p>\n

Chinese graphics processing unit designer Biren is using Huali’s 7 nm line \u200cfor tape-out, a process in which a chip design \u200bis committed to a physical prototype \u200bfor testing before mass production begins, one of the sources said.<\/p>\n

Placed on a U.S. trade blacklist in 2023, Biren lost access to TSMC’s contract manufacturing service shortly after. Biren did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n

The Hua Hong Fab 6 is the \u200bmost advanced of seven foundries within the Hua \u200cHong Group and currently manufactures logic chips using 22 nm and 28 nm process nodes, according to the company’s \u200bwebsite.<\/p>\n

By contrast, its Fab 5 produces chips using mature technologies ranging from 40 nm to 55 nm.<\/p>\n

($1 = 6.8855 yuan)<\/p>\n

(Reporting \u200bby Fanny Potkin; Editing by Miyoung Kim, Thomas Derpinghaus and Jan Harvey)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SINGAPORE, March 16 (Reuters) – China’s Hua Hong Group has developed advanced chip manufacturing technologies that can be…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":544691,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[64,63,99,512,269784,269786,164,269787,269783,269782,269785],"class_list":["post-544690","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-china","tag-chipmaker","tag-contract-manufacturing","tag-economy","tag-equipment-suppliers","tag-hua-hong","tag-hua-hong-group","tag-manufacturing-technologies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/544690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=544690"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/544690\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/544691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=544690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=544690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=544690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}