Huawei Starts a New Era in Chip Manufacturing: 3D Technology to the Rescue

07:54 / 05.07.2026·33·Technology

Chinese tech giant Huawei has chosen an unexpected but effective path to increase the performance of its Kirin processors. Cut off from the most modern lithography equipment due to Western sanctions, the company is now focusing on vertical chip placement, namely 3D stacking technology. This method serves to maximize the capabilities of the existing 7 nanometer process. This is reported by Ixbt.com news reports.

According to ixbt.com, Huawei plans to abandon the traditional flat structure in its next-generation processors and place crystals on top of each other. This technology, called hybrid bonding, connects computing blocks using thousands of ultra-dense vertical contacts. This drastically reduces the distance data travels between the CPU, GPU, and memory.

Strategy to bypass technological restrictions

Currently, Huawei is limited to the 7-nm process produced at SMIC factories. While world leaders are working on 3-nm and even 2-nm, the Chinese brand is forced to increase efficiency by "growing the height" of its chips. Vertical placement not only increases data transfer speed but also helps reduce energy consumption.

This innovation is especially critical for processing artificial intelligence (AI) functions directly on the device. High throughput allows neural processing units (NPU) to perform complex tasks faster and with less heating. This is expected to become one of the key factors ensuring the competitiveness of Huawei smartphones.

General industry trend

Interestingly, Huawei is not alone in this direction. The entire semiconductor industry is moving from shrinking transistors to more efficient packaging methods. Industry experts note that other major players are also adopting similar technologies:

Samsung is considering separate placement of memory and computing blocks in future Exynos 2700 chips;
Apple plans to use the multi-die WMCM packaging method for the first time in its A20 Pro processors;
NVIDIA and other server processor manufacturers have already been extensively using 3D stacking.

In the Uzbekistan market, Huawei smartphones are valued for their robust software and cameras. The introduction of new technology allows the brand to offer high-performance flagships to fans even under sanctions. This proves that in the technological race, not only the number of nanometers but also the engineering approach is important.