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Huawei's New Mystery 7nm Chip from Chinese Fab Defies US Sanctions
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this post was submitted on 03 Sep 2023
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According to this links the SSA/800-10W is a 28nm lithography machine:
https://techwireasia.com/2023/08/the-first-28nm-lithography-machine-in-china-this-year/
I also read this article about the 02 Special Project and SMEE in it doesn't mention anything below 90nm:
https://equalocean.com/analysis/2021062316392
The experts I listened to mentioned that China cannot go below the 20nm regime, that's specifically the bottleneck they are dealing with right now. And if even everything you say is correct and China supposedly has this capability, it doesn't take away that China still has not made sub 10nm chips with home brew equipment.
There are special difficulties that come with entering the 10nm space. As I mentioned in another comment, I attended a presentation by researcher about developing lithography process in the sub 9nm scale, this was only 10 years ago and it shows how slow development is.
Also, I don't think China is shy about replacing a foreign product with a domestically produced product. If they indeed had 7nm and 5nm capability as you mentioned, based on their history, they would have subsidized and made it work regardless of market forces.
28nm is the nominal resolution of the scanner. The chips that can be made with a single exposure. In that measure no ASML DUV scanner is 7nm either. The physics of 193nm light makes it impossible for any DUV scanner to have a nominal resolution of 7nm. 7nm chips are made using DUV by exposing 4 times at a 28nm resolution. The same quad patterning techniques allows 22nm chips to be made with a 90nm machine.
The name is also misleading 7nm chips aren't sub 9nm. TSMC's 7nm chips are physically 10nm. The marketing names haven't matched for years. It all started when TSMC sold 20nm FinFET under 16nm branding as they believed the addition of FinFET gave it 16nm performance. Then the entire industry adjusted their naming conventions to match with TSMC.
SMIC, Huawei didn't get to where they are by compromising. They never would've bought the Chinese domestic alternatives if not for sanctions. Price doesn't matter in this industry, what they're looking for is the best in the market. This is not the type of capital equipment that subsidies can sell. Which is why when US scanner manufacturers couldn't compete with ASML, they completely failed as economically viable businesses and their assets were sold off.