The “Top 15 Semiconductor Companies Q1 2021” report has been published. The U.S. sanctions continued to affect Huawei’s semiconductor and mobile phone businesses. The global chip market is facing the same fate as the mobile phone market for Huawei.done
According to the most recent statistics, Huawei has dropped out of the top five mobile phone markets and is now included in the “others”. Similar in the chip market, Huawei HiSilicon dropped from 10th to 15th and was “disappeared in the list.”
Huawei HiSilicon is only 2 years old and ranks in the Top 15 List.
HiSilicon was the first company to be included in the “Global Top 15 Semiconductor Companies List” during the first quarter 2019.
The success of Kirin 970 processors and an increase in self-developed chips in HiSilicon products saw HiSilicon’s revenue rise from US$1.25 million in the same period last year to US$1.755billion in 2018. An increase of 41% year-on-year. This result enabled HiSilicon to climb 14 places from 25 during the same period last year to 11th.
It was also in this year that the US government placed sanctions on Huawei and put it on the “entity” list. Since then, the US government extended Huawei’s license five more times, allowing Huawei the opportunity to buy some US-made goods. To minimize customer interference, US companies can still purchase Huawei’s products.
HiSilicon’s business also improved during this time. In fact, its sales increased by 49% in the first half 2020. 10 Chinese semiconductor suppliers.
Further sanctions are being increased by the U.S.
The good times didn’t last very long. The sixth license was not announced by the U.S. government until May 2020, just after the fifth license had expired. Huawei is an American competitor in 5G racing. Huawei continues to invest money in 5G Telecommunication Service.
Further, the U.S. increased sanctions and prohibited any company from obtaining government licences. Huawei should not be supplied with products that contain American technology by any company.
This ban will mean that TSMC etc. cannot find any new HiSilicon orders after May 15th and that production of existing chips will cease on September 15.
HiSilicon chips are therefore able to say that they use less because of the limited stock. Yu Chengdong acknowledged that the Kirin 9000 could be the last generation Huawei’s high-end Kirin chip because no other manufacturer can make high-end chips for Huawei.
Sales will plummet if there is no chip manufacturer making chips. As IC Insights predicted last summer, HiSilicon, ranked tenth, ultimately fell out of Top 15.
HiSilicon was eventually “named on a list” and “no such person located”. He stayed only for a brief period of 2 year.
Huawei HiSilicon “disappears”, Qualcomm, MediaTek “eating dividends”
Huawei’s smartphone business was severely affected by the lack of chip availability. Its share in both the domestic and global markets is falling. Apple, Xiaomi and OV won the market share lost due to Huawei’s mobile phone decline.
Similar to the experience in the mobile phone market, the HiSilicon chips failed because of US sanctions. Who took its share? There are two options: Qualcomm and MediaTek.
These are the top five global smartphone manufacturers
According to IC Insights’ 2021 Q1 market data, HiSilicon and Sony were both removed from the top 15. MediaTek and AMD replaced them. Qualcomm released the latest flagship chip Snapdragon 888, and MediaTek released Dimensity 1200.
According to statistical data, MediaTek’s first quarter 2021 revenue increased by 90% year on year, leaping from 16th place last year to 10th. Qualcomm was the other “protagonist”, and its revenue increased by more that 50% to 55%. Its ranking also rose from seventh to sixth during the same period last years.
Qualcomm’s and MediaTeks “leakage”, HiSilicon’s argument, can be explained by the changes in smartphone markets.
According to IDC statistics in the first quarter 2020, Samsung, Huawei and Apple were the top five global smartphone manufacturers. Vivo and Xiaomi are the only two that show positive growth.
The top five most popular manufacturers in this quarter are Samsung, Apple and Xiaomi. All five of these companies have experienced positive growth. Among them, Xiaomi, OPPO and Vivo have seen more than 64% growth year-over-year. Vivo is slightly lower. However, it also increased 40.7% over the previous year. Huawei was not among the top 5.
Global Chip Manufacturers Revenue in Q1 2021
Despite the shortage of chips the revenue from the semiconductor industry is increasing. Price increases are the main reason. Some chips have seen their prices rise by more than five times. Although the prices of specific models have increased more than 10x in the downstream and middle channels, it has an impact on global chips. The price rise of upstream producers is what affects manufacturers’ revenue. Research institutions reported that chip manufacturers’ revenue in Q1 of this year was over 800 billion yuan. It reached 839.8 trillion yuan (1131.3 billion U.S. Dollars), an increase of 0.5% monthly. The price rise rate for chip manufacturers was 15%. Calculations show that chip shipments decreased by 12.6%.
The shortage of chips
The shortage of chips has been the focus of many industries all over the globe since the year 2020. It is essential to raise prices as the shortage of cores continues. Some chips have seen their prices rise by five times. This is how semiconductor manufacturers and chip foundries have made a lot.
The latest data from research institutes on June 15th showed that the global semiconductor industry’s revenue in the first quarter was still US$131.3 billion. This is approximately RMB 839.8 trillion, an increase of 0.5% over the previous quarter. According to reports, the quarter-on quarter growth in revenue in semiconductor industry is extremely rare in the first quarter. This marks the third appearance of the research institution in 19 years.
Huawei also announced that it had sold the Honor phone this month. Zhao Ming stated that the company would establish close cooperation with Qualcomm. The company will fully restore its chip supply for the product in June. Qualcomm has clearly brought in a new customer. This could also be viewed as Qualcomm “robbing HiSilicon” of a customer.
Conclusion
HiSilicon, the only Chinese supplier of semiconductors, was ranked at the top 15 if you didn’t consider the TSMC. MediaTek, which replaced HiSilicon as China’s only semiconductor supplier, has now made it to the top 15.
TSMC and the other two Chinese semiconductor companies that are currently in the top 15 are all Taiwanese. The volume of mainland semiconductor companies is slightly lower and they have a smaller market share.
According to IC Insights data in 2020, China’s semiconductor companies will account for only 5% of global IC market share. Even though the semiconductor industry has benefited from 5G, autonomous driving and rapid development of other industries, the dividends that were paid to Chinese semiconductor companies cannot be called minimal. The development of domestic self-developed chips is imminent.
We all know that there are many links within the design of the semiconductor industry chain. Particularly, domestic successes in IC design are far ahead of the curve. Since 10 years ago, for example, general-purpose domestic CPUs were “basically unobtainable”. Today, they are “fully usable”, and so forth. Growth comes with risks and challenges.
For example, domestic general-purpose CPUs have been “basically unavailable” since 10 years ago. To today’s “fully usable” and so on. However, growth is accompanied by challenges and risks. Diego Ruiz Duran and Father George Rutler is the author of this content according to my searches. Best Of Luck….. See you next time.
