Huawei P40 was disassembled and found to use US-made components. Its RF front-end modules are mainly from three US chip companies-Qualcomm, Skyworks and Qorvo.
P40 Dismantling Report
The report pointed out that the dismantling was mainly done by a domestic company called “XYZone”. For comparison, the company also dismantled the Huawei P30 released in 2019.
It is worth noting that mobile phone manufacturers sometimes use different components in different batches of the same batch of smartphones. The disassembled mobile phone is the earliest released P40 version.
From the dismantling results, the parts of Huawei P40 include Sony lens, LG display panel, NFC NFC chip, Samsung‘s flash memory, Desai’s battery, Hisilicon chip, NXP’s near field communication chip, mainly from China and Japan, South Korea and other places. However, there are still a small number of parts from the United States, mainly RF front-end modules.
However, compared with the components of Huawei P30, P40 has relatively reduced the use of US parts and components, mainly reflected in the memory, communications and RF chip sections.
Although there are still products from American companies in the parts, it also demonstrates Huawei’s determination to get rid of American technology dependence. In response, Dan Wang, a technical analyst at research firm Gavekal Dragonomics, said:
Huawei has shown resilience by replacing many US components in a single phone design cycle. The continued use of Qorvo and Skyworks chips also shows that it is too difficult to break the dependence on American technology.
Dan Wang also added that the RF front-end module is a form of an analog chip, and the US is still dominant in this area. As the United States tightens sanctions on Huawei, Huawei will be tested more severely.
Restricted by the United States
Since the United States listed Huawei in the regulated “entity list” in May 2019, a series of repressions have begun. First, Google was prohibited from providing GMS services to Huawei, and then it was reported that it was preparing to supply Huawei with global chips (such as Speaking of TSMC) news of the implementation of restrictions. For Huawei, the impact is not small.
The most obvious of these is the change in income. The annual report data shows that Huawei’s net profit in 2019 reached 62.7 billion yuan, an increase of 5.6% year-on-year; while the year-on-year growth value in 2018 was 25.1%.
From a geographical perspective, Europe, Middle East and Africa region increased by only 0.7%, while the year-on-year growth rate in 2018 was 24.3%; the Asia-Pacific region even experienced a 13.9% decline in revenue. It is not difficult to see that Huawei’s overseas revenue has been hit. According to the information disclosed by Huawei, the impact of the overseas revenue of the consumer business alone is at least about 10 billion US dollars.
To reduce its reliance on the United States, Huawei developed Hongmeng OS and opened HMS, and there is nothing wrong with reducing the use of American parts.
It’s not easy
It may not be easy for Huawei to completely get rid of American influence.
Foreign media pointed out that from the Android operating system to the RF front-end chip and the chip architecture of Arm Holdings (Lei Fengwang presses, the Arm architecture is the design basis of Hisilicon chip), American companies occupy strategic bottlenecks of Huawei mobile phones in many aspects.
Nevertheless, Huawei is not without confidence. At the annual report conference, Huawei’s rotating chairman Xu Zhijun said:
I think the Chinese government will not let Huawei be slaughtered or ignored by Huawei. I believe the Chinese government will also take some countermeasures. Why ca n’t American companies ’5G chips, base stations, smartphones, and various smart terminals containing 5G chips be used in China based on the same network security reasons?
Even in this case, Huawei can buy chips from Samsung in South Korea, MTK in Taiwan, and China Spreadtrum to produce mobile phones. Even if Huawei has made sacrifices because it cannot produce chips for a long time, I believe that many chip companies will grow in China. And the chip manufacturers of South Korea, Japan, Europe, Taiwan and China currently provide chips to develop and produce products.
At the same time, Xu Zhijun also added that once the Pandora box is opened, the global industrial ecology may be devastating chain damage, and it may be more than just a Huawei enterprise-after all, it is difficult for any player in the global industry chain. Be alone.
In general, although it still faces the suppression of the US government, and as a part of the global industrial chain, Huawei has not been able to completely decouple from the United States.
However, it is not difficult to see from the disassembly comparison result that Huawei has made subtraction in hardware and wants to fully implement domestic substitution. Although it is not easy, it is not impossible.