"If enforced starting in September, the new rules will eventually impede the Shenzhen-based company’s ability to fulfill its obligations with China’s telecom majors in building the country’s next-generation network infrastructure — Huawei already accounts for as much as 60% of mobile network infrastructure. HiSilicon’s
Tiangang series of semiconductors — manufactured by TSMC using advanced 7 nm node process technology — are critical to the functioning of Huawei’s 5G base station offerings. The firm appears to have stockpiled some semiconductors, but if production at TSMC is fully cut off, it will not be able to continue producing key pieces of equipment undergirding new infrastructure very far into 2021. New infrastructure is likely to require new approaches at the equipment level, particularly if Huawei rival ZTE cannot ramp up fast enough to take up some of the slack."
a. It specifically said 7nm chip in Huawei 5G base station.
b. Stockpiles will empty out in 2021
However, we all know Huawei has "solutions" which could be any combination of these:
- a semi line in Beijing mentioned by WTAN(?)
- 28nm resolution litho machine from SMEE will do the job even for 7nm node
- another line, perhaps w samsung
- could even be using FPGAs?
The thing is, Huawei/China seem rather calm which could mean they are confident enough of several solutions.