We may never know how Huawei managed to do this, considering the sanctions and the company’s placement on the entity list along with SMIC. This prevents both companies from accessing their supply chain in the US without obtaining a license. But several benchmark tests performed on the 7nm Kirin 9000 and the older chip that Huawei used for the Mate 40 series, the 5nm Kirin 9000 (which is also a 5G chip), reveal that the older chipset is an overall better component than the newer one.
The 2020 Kirin 9000 SoC offers much better graphics than the 2023 Kirin 9000s
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Tom’s Hardware) recently submitted devices powered by both chips to different benchmark tests and found that while the CPU performance has been slightly improved in the newer Kirin 9000, the Kirin 9000 scored higher in other tests. In Geekbench 6, the new SoC scored a single-core score of 1315 and a multi-core score of 4078 compared to the scores of 1259 single-core and 3486 multi-core recorded by the 2020 Kirin 9000.
In AnTuTu 10, both application processors had similar performance, with the Kirin 9000 outperforming the 9000s by a score of 897,496 to 894,530. But one area where the new chip fell short by a fairly large margin was in GPU score, where the new chip scored 200,982 compared to the higher 315,801 presented by the older chip. The GPU in the higher scoring Kirin 9000 was the 24-core Mali-G78. The newer Kirin 9000 uses a 4-core Maleoon-910 and offers GPU performance in line with the 2020 Snapdragon 888, which used the Adreno 660 GPU.
Speaking of graphics, in the 3DMark Wild Life, the 2020 chip was 20% faster than the 2023 chip. And, obviously, the older chip was more energy efficient than the newer one. This could be largely due to the process node used to build the two SoCs with the Kirin 9000 manufactured by TSMC using its 5nm node and the Kirin 9000 produced by SMIC using its second generation 7nm node.
Huawei and SMIC can only go so far with the deep ultraviolet lithography machine (DUV) they can import. To go below 7nm, the pair may have to check out the nanoimprint lithography technology (NIL) from Cannon, announced in October. This technology can be used to manufacture 5nm chips and possibly 2nm in the future. Extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) machines used in next-generation chips are banned from being shipped to Chinese companies.
A more concerning development might occur soon based on last year’s patent applications from Huawei
Lithography machines are used to etch circuit patterns into silicon wafers that are then cut into individual dies. With billions of transistors inside chips, EUV machines are vital because they can etch lines finer than a human hair on the wafers, allowing for the construction of more powerful and energy-efficient chips. A possible concern for US authorities is that about a year ago, Huawei reportedly applied for patents covering EUV components and the process of using the technology.
There is no indication that any of the technologies mentioned in the patent application have been used by SMIC to manufacture the Kirin 9000. But if Huawei can develop its own cutting-edge lithography technology that escapes the reach of US sanctions, it will be much more surprising and concerning for US lawmakers.
In addition to the smaller transistors used in the 2020 Kirin 9000 compared to the 9000s, the CPU cores in the older chip have a clock speed up to 19% faster (3.13 GHz vs. 2.62 GHz) and better instruction set architecture.