Samsung Galaxy Note 20 series could be the first smartphones to break the 7nm barrier
TSMC is also expected to ship the 5nm HiSilicon Kirin 1020 SoC to Huawei for the latter’s flagship Mate 40 family later this year. But Huawei might have problems obtaining cutting-edge chips starting with next year’s P50 camera-centric models. That’s because of an export rule change announced by the U.S.; no foundry using American-made technology can ship semiconductors to Huawei without a license from the U.S. Commerce Department. However, chips made from wafers that were under production when the rule change was announced can be shipped to Huawei as long as they are delivered by the middle of September. That could allow Huawei to have enough chips for the Mate 40 phones.
Besides Apple’s customized A14 Bionic SoC, the four iPhone 12 models will each have a Snapdragon X60 5G modem according to industry sources. The modem supports both sub-6GHz and mmWave 5G signals; yet the latest rumors call for sub-6GHz support for the iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Plus and support for the faster mmWave signals on the iPhone 12 Pro units. However, if both the standard and Pro models use the same 5G modem chip as the Digitimes report suggests, we could see all four variants of the iPhone 12 line run on both 5G signals.