bet on your own chips

China wants to lead the electric car industry, and plan to achieve it by dominating the chip supply chain that give them life. The country, in search of its technological self -sufficiency in an industry that represents about 10% of its national GDPhas urged its manufacturers to win in the semiconductor career for electric cars.

A large -scale plan. Sources of Nikkei Asia They claim that the main groups of Chinese car, including Saic Motor, Byd, Li Auto and Geely are preparing to launch models equipped with 100% national manufacturing chips.

From 2026, at least two Chinese companies are expected to produce semiconductors for automotive. It is something that has already begun to be seen, with movements such as Xpeng or child betting on your own manufacturing chips for its most recent electric vehicles. On June 13 we saw the XPEng G7, the first car of the Chinese company to replace Nvidia chips for own chips that promised a three -time performance.

2027 as a key year. With the start of mass production of vehicle semiconductors, China would be setting the most ambitious objective in 2027: 100% national manufacturing in each of the chips equipped in its vehicles.

It is a project under the supervision of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of China (MIIT)who would be summoning manufacturers regularly to know their national chip adoption rates.

What is being done. Recently, Xpeng announced its Turing AI chip, with a computing capacity that, supposedly, triples to that of the Nvidia Orin. It is one of the most ambitious responses to Nvidia, and expects divisions such as Volkswagen in China to end up adopting this type of solutions. Why Volkswagen? Because Both have agreements for Manufacture electric cars.

Other Chinese manufacturers, such as child, They announced their Shenji Nx9031your chip to boost autonomous driving functions. The problem? It was manufactured in the lithographic process of five nanometers, and that can only mean one thing.

External agreements. China is in full Sprint stage with its semiconductors. Is about to have the ability to make 5NM chips and SMIC expects to reach 3NM lithographic processes in 2026 But, at least for the moment, the chips of their rivals are more advanced.

This is why companies like Nio have opted for companies external to China (They do not detail who manufactures the Shenjibut its 5 nm process details that it is not national), and Xiaomi has allied with TSMC To manufacture your Xring 01the company’s first smartphones processor that competes directly with the A18 PRO of Apple and The best of Qualcomm. The company He has already announced that he will take his chips to carsand the big doubt is whether he will do it with TSMC as an ally.

China has the ability to master this industry. There are three pillars that largely determine the success of an electric car that intends to sell anywhere in the world.

• Batteries (autonomy and load)
• Price
• Software (operating system, cabin functionalities, etc.)

In the 2023 China Electric Vehicle Forum, the Institute for Market Economics Studies revealed that the external dependence of automobile chips was close to 95%. The key point is that cars chips are very varied: microcontrollers, memories, sensors … Most of them can occur with the current lithography teams that China has.

In fact, there is a key here. Among the large chips suppliers for cars are already companies such as Huawei, Semiconductor and STM Microelectronics ByD. With the focus on the domain of the semiconductors, manufacturers outside China betting on Chinese software, and the country winning the battery careerChina has everything to end up dominating this industry sooner or later.

A conquest outside and inside. The war that China is playing is not just internal. The country has the potential to dominate in markets such as the European. Spain is the best example, with brands like Mg heading the sales rankingsand giants like Chery disembarking in our country with Jaecoo and omoda.

China no longer has the West as a mirror. His new heads in automotive fight with their own identity, a clear domain in areas where the European car has been left behind, and A deeper consumer understanding Regarding that of the brands they manufacture in Europe.

Image | Geely

In Xataka | Chinese cars no longer compete against the West. Compete against the future itself