MIC: Huawei's mobile phone chip inventory can be maintained until the first quarter of next year

According to Taiwan media Central News Agency, Zheng Kaian, senior industry analyst and product manager of the Institute for Information Industry (MIC), pointed out that before the latest US ban on Huawei came into effect, Huawei had been actively stocking up, and it is expected that its mobile phone chip inventory will be able to maintain market demand until the first quarter of 2021, and 5G base station chips can meet market demand throughout next year.

Regarding Huawei's chip inventory, Huawei's rotating chairman Guo Ping recently responded at the Huawei 2020 All-Connect Conference that the last batch was rushed into storage on September 15, the day the ban came into effect, and the specific reserves are still being counted. At present, the chip reserves for To B business are relatively sufficient, and mobile phone chips are still actively looking for solutions.

However, Zheng Kaian also warned that if the United States imposes export controls on semiconductor equipment, it will affect the development of China's semiconductor industry. Although Chinese manufacturers can use solutions from local or Japanese equipment manufacturers to replace some process equipment, it will still have a significant impact on Chinese manufacturers' development of advanced processes.

In addition, from the perspective of Taiwan's industrial chain, Zheng Kaian believes that Taiwan's advanced process capacity continues to be fully loaded, and the US ban on Huawei has little impact on Taiwan's IC manufacturing industry. For example, from TSMC's perspective, major customers such as AMD, Nvidia, MediaTek, Qualcomm, and Apple are about to usher in the peak shipping season and have gradually increased 5nm/7nm orders.