HiSilicon

HiSilicon is a Chinese fabless semiconductor company based in Shenzhen, Guangdong province and wholly owned by Huawei. HiSilicon purchases licenses for CPU designs from ARM Holdings, including the ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore, ARM Cortex-M3, ARM Cortex-A7 MPCore, ARM Cortex-A15 MPCore, ARM Cortex-A53, ARM Cortex-A57 and also for their Mali graphics cores. HiSilicon has also purchased licenses from Vivante Corporation for their GC4000 graphics core.
HiSilicon is reputed to be the largest domestic designer of integrated circuits in China. In 2020, the United States instituted rules that require any American firms providing equipment to HiSilicon or non-American firms who use American technologies or IPR (such as TSMC) that supply HiSilicon to have licenses as part of the ongoing trade dispute, and Huawei announced it will stop producing its Kirin chipset from 15 September 2020 onwards due to this disruption of supply chain. On August 29th 2023, Huawei announced the first fully domestically fabricated chip, the Kirin 9000S, which is used on its latest Mate 60 Pro phablet phones.
Branch
HiSilicon (Shanghai) Technologies CO., Ltd
HiSilicon (Shanghai) Technologies CO., Ltd is a fabless semiconductor and IC design company.
HiSilicon Technologies Co Ltd
HiSilicon Technologies Co. Ltd. manufactures semiconductor products. The Company designs, develops, produces, and provides network monitoring chips, video-phone chips, and other chips for wireless networks, fixed networks, and digital media fields.
History
Shenzhen HiSilicon Semiconductor Co., Ltd. was Huawei's ASIC Design Center, which was founded in 1991.
2004– Shenzhen HiSilicon Semiconductor Co., Ltd. was registered and the company was formally established.
2016– Kirin960 designed by HiSilicon was awarded as one of "best of Android 2016" by Android Authority.
2019– Shanghai HiSilicon, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Huawei was established.
Smartphone application processors
HiSilicon develops SoCs based on the ARM architecture. Though not exclusive, these SoCs see preliminary use in handheld and tablet devices of its parent company Huawei.
K3V2
The first well known product of HiSilicon is the K3V2 used in Huawei Ascend D Quad XL (U9510) smartphones and Huawei MediaPad 10 FHD7 tablets. This chipset is based on the ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore fabbed at 40 nm and uses a 16 core Vivante GC4000 GPU.
The SoC supports LPDDR2-1066, but actual products are found with LPDDR-900 instead for lower power consumption.
K3V2E
This is a revised version of K3V2 SoC with improved support of Intel baseband.
The SoC supports LPDDR2-1066, but actual products are found with LPDDR-900 instead for lower power consumption.
Kirin 620
• supports – USB 2.0 / 13 MP / 1080p video encode
Kirin 650, 655, 658, 659
Kirin 710
Kirin 810 and 820
DaVinci NPU based on Tensor Arithmetic Unit
Kirin 820 supported 5G NSA & SA
Kirin 910 and 910T
Kirin 920, 925 and 928
• The Kirin 920 SoC also contains an image processor that supports up to 32-megapixel
Kirin 930 and 935
• supports – SD 3.0 (UHS-I) / eMMC 4.51 / Dual-band a/b/g/n Wi-Fi / Bluetooth 4.0 Low Energy / USB 2.0 / 32 MP ISP / 1080p video encode
Kirin 950 and 955
• supports – SD 4.1 (UHS-II) / UFS 2.0 / eMMC 5.1 / MU-MIMO 802.11ac Wi-Fi / Bluetooth 4.2 Smart / USB 3.0 / NFS / Dual ISP (42 MP) / Native 10-bit 4K video encode / i5 coprocessor / Tensilica HiFi 4 DSP
Kirin 960
Interconnect: ARM CCI-550, Storage: UFS 2.1, eMMC 5.1, Sensor Hub: i6
Kirin 970
Interconnect: ARM CCI-550, Storage: UFS 2.1, Sensor Hub: i7
Cadence Tensilica Vision P6 DSP.
NPU made in collaboration with Cambricon Technologies. 1.92T FP16 OPS.
Kirin 980 and Kirin 985 5G/4G
Kirin 980 is HiSilicon's first SoC based on 7 nm FinFET technology.
Interconnect: ARM Mali G76-MP10, Storage: UFS 2.1, Sensor Hub: i8
Dual NPU made in collaboration with Cambricon Technologies.
Kirin 985 5G is the second Hisilicon's 5G SoC based on 7 nm FinFET Technology.
Interconnect: ARM Mali-G77 MP8, Storage UFS 3.0
Big-Tiny Da Vinci NPU: 1x Da Vinci Lite + 1x Da Vinci Tiny
Kirin 990 4G, Kirin 990 5G and Kirin 990E 5G
Kirin 990 5G is HiSilicon's first 5G SoC based on N7 nm+ FinFET technology.
Interconnect
Kirin 990 4G: ARM Mali-G76 MP16
Kirin 990 5G: ARM Mali-G76 MP16
Kirin 990E 5G: ARM Mali-G76 MP14
Da Vinci NPU.
Kirin 990 4G: 1x Da Vinci Lite + 1x Da Vinci Tiny
Kirin 990 5G: 2x Da Vinci Lite + 1x Da Vinci Tiny
Kirin 990E 5G: 1x Da Vinci Lite + 1x Da Vinci Tiny
Da Vinci Lite features 3D Cube Tensor Computing Engine (2048 FP16 MACs + 4096 INT8 MACs), Vector unit (1024bit INT8/FP16/FP32)
Da Vinci Tiny features 3D Cube Tensor Computing Engine (256 FP16 MACs + 512 INT8 MACs), Vector unit (256bit INT8/FP16/FP32)
Kirin 9000 5G/4G and Kirin 9000E
Kirin 9000 is HiSilicon's first SoC based on 5 nm+ FinFET (EUV) TSMC technology (N5 node) and the first 5 nm SoC to be launched on the international market.
This octa-core eight threads system on a chip is based on the 9th Gen of the HiSilicon Kirin series and is equipped with 15.3 billion of transistors in a 1+3+4 configuration: 4 Arm Cortex-A77 CPU (1x 3,13 GHz and 3x 2,54 GHz), 4 Arm Cortex-A55 (4x 2,05 GHz) and a 24-core Mali-G78 GPU (22-core in the Kirin 9000E version) with Kirin Gaming+ 3.0 implementation. The integrated quad pipeline NPU (Dual Big Core + 1 Tiny Core configuration) is equipped with a Kirin ISP 6.0 to support advanced computational photography. The Huawei Da Vinci Architecture 2.0 for AI supports 2x Ascend Lite + 1x Ascend Tiny (only 1 Lite in 9000E). The system cache is 8 MB and the SoC works with the new LPDDR5/4X memories (made by Samsung in the Huawei Mate 40 series). Due to the integrated 3rd generation 5G proprietary modem "Balong 5000", Kirin 9000 supports 2G, 3G, 4G and 5G SA & NSA Sub-6GHz connectivity. The SoC TDP is 6W.
The 2021 4G version of the Kirin 9000 has the Balong modem limited via software to comply with the ban imposed on Huawei by the US government for non-chinese 5G technologies.
Interconnect
Kirin 9000E: ARM Mali-G78 MP22
Kirin 9000: ARM Mali-G78 MP24
Da Vinci NPU architecture 2.0
Kirin 9000E: 1x Big Core + 1x Tiny Core
Kirin 9000: 2x Big Cores + 1x Tiny Core
Kirin 9000s
Kirin 9000s is the very first HiSilicon developed SoC to be manufactured in high volumes in mainland China at SMIC. The chip is based on a 7nm technology node, SMIC internally called "N+2" and produced on ASML Twinscan NXT:1980Di, the most advanced immersion lithography (DUV) scanner from Netherlands ASML.
Smartphone modems
HiSilicon develops smartphone modems which although not exclusively, these SoCs see preliminary use in handheld and tablet devices of its parent company Huawei.
Balong 700
The Balong 700 supports LTE TDD/FDD. Its specs:
3GPP R8 protocol
LTE TDD and FDD
4x2/2x2 SU-MIMO
Balong 710
At MWC 2012 HiSilicon released the Balong 710. It is a multi-mode chipset supporting 3GPP Release 9 and LTE Category 4 at GTI (Global TD-LTE Initiative). The Balong 710 was designed to be used with the K3V2 SoC. Its specs:
LTE FDD mode : 150 Mbit/s downlink and 50 Mbit/s uplink.
TD-LTE mode: up to 112 Mbit/s downlink and up to 30 Mbit/s uplink.
WCDMA Dual Carrier with MIMO: 84Mbit/s downlink and 23Mbit/s uplink.
Balong 720
The Balong 720 supports LTE Cat6 with 300 Mbit/s peak download rate. Its specs:
TSMC 28 nm HPM process
TD-LTE Cat.6 standard
Dual-carrier aggregation for the 40 MHz bandwidth
5-mode LTE Cat6 Modem
Balong 750
The Balong 750 supports LTE Cat 12/13, and it is first to support 4CC CA and 3.5 GHz. Its specs:
LTE Cat.12 and Cat.13 UL network standards
2CC (dual-carrier) data aggregation
4x4 multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO)
TSMC 16 nm FinFET+ process
Balong 765
The Balong 765 supports 8×8 MIMO technology, LTE Cat.19 with downlink data-rate up to 1.6 Gbit/s in FDD network and up to 1.16 Gbit/s in the TD-LTE network. Its specs:
3GPP Rel.14
LTE Cat.19 Peak data rate up to 1.6 Gbit/s
4CC CA + 4×4 MIMO/2CC CA + 8×8 MIMO
DL 256QAM
C-V2X
Balong 5G01
The Balong 5G01 supports the 3GPP standard for 5G with downlink speeds of up to 2.3 Gbit/s. It supports 5G across all frequency bands including sub-6 GHz and millimeter wave (mmWave). Its specs:
3GPP Release 15
Peak data rate up to 2.3 Gbit/s
Sub-6 GHz and mmWave
NSA/SA
DL 256QAM
Balong 5000
The Balong 5000 is the world's first 7 nm TSMC 5G multi-mode chipset (launched in Q1 2019), the world's first SA/NSA implementation and the first smartphone chipset to support the full NR TDD/FDD spectrum. The modem has an advanced 2G, 3G, 4G, and 5G connectivity. Its specs:
2G/3G/4G/5G Multi Mode
Fully compliant with 3GPP Release 15
Sub-6 GHz: 100 MHz x 2CC CA
Sub-6 GHz: Downlink up to 4.6 Gbit/s, Uplink up to 2.5 Gbit/s
mmWave: Downlink up to 6.5 Gbit/s, Uplink up to 3.5 Gbit/s
NR+LTE: Downlink up to 7.5 Gbit/s
FDD & TDD Spectrum Access
SA & NSA Fusion Network Architecture
Supports 3GPP R14 V2X
3GB LPDDR4X RAM
Wearable SoCs
HiSilicon develops SoCs for wearables such as truly wireless earbuds, wireless headphones, neckband earbuds, smart speakers, smart eyewear and smartwatches.
Kirin A1
The Kirin A1(Hi1132) was announced on 6 September 2019. It features:
BT/BLE dual-mode Bluetooth 5.1
Isochronous Dual Channel transmission technology
356 MHz audio processor
Cortex-M7 micro processor
Server processors
HiSilicon develops server processor SoCs based on the ARM architecture.
Hi1610
The Hi1610 is HiSilicon's first generation server processor announced in 2015. It features:
16x ARM Cortex-A57 at up to 2.1 GHz
48 KB L1-I, 32 KB L1-D, 1MB L2/4 cores and 16MB CCN L3
TSMC 16 nm
2x DDR4-1866
16 PCIe 3.0
Hi1612
The Hi1612 is HiSilicon's second generation server processor launched in 2016. It is the first chiplet-baesd Kunpeng with two computing dies. It features:
32x ARM Cortex-A57 at up to 2.1 GHz
48 KB L1-I, 32 KB L1-D, 1MB L2/4 cores and 32MB CCN L3
TSMC 16 nm
4x DDR4-2133
16 PCIe 3.0
Kunpeng 916 (formerly Hi1616)
The Kunpeng 916 (formerly known as Hi1616) is HiSilicon's third generation server processor launched in 2017. The Kunpeng 916 is used in Huawei's TaiShan 2280 Balanced Server, TaiShan 5280 Storage Server, TaiShan XR320 High-Density Server Node and TaiShan X6000 High-Density Server. It features:
32x ARM Cortex-A72 at up to 2.4 GHz
48 KB L1-I, 32 KB L1-D, 1 MB L2/4 cores and 32 MB CCN L3
TSMC 16 nm
4x DDR4-2400
2-way Symmetric multiprocessing (SMP), Each socket has 2x ports with 96 Gbit/s per port (total of 192 Gbit/s per each socket interconnects)
46 PCIe 3.0 and 8x 10 Gigabit Ethernet
85 W
Kunpeng 920 (formerly Hi1620)
The Kunpeng 920 (formerly known as Hi1620) is HiSilicon's fourth generation server processor announced in 2018, launched in 2019. Huawei claim the Kunpeng 920 CPU scores more than an estimated 930 on SPECint_rate_base2006. The Kunpeng 920 is used in Huawei's TaiShan 2280 V2 Balanced Server, TaiShan 5280 V2 Storage Server and TaiShan XA320 V2 High-Density Server Node. It features:
32 to 64x custom TaiShan v110 cores at up to 2.6 GHz.
The TaiShan v110 core is a 4-way out-of-order superscalar that implements the ARMv8.2-A ISA. Huawei reports the core supports almost all the ARMv8.4-A ISA features with a few exceptions, including dot product and the FP16 FML extension.
The TaiShan v110 cores are likely a new core not based on ARM designs
3x Simple ALUs, 1x Complex MDU, 2x BRUs (sharing ports with ALU2/3), 2x FSUs (ASIMD FPU), 2x LSUs
64 KB L1-I, 64 KB L1-D, 512 KB Private L2 and 1 MB L3/core Shared.
TSMC 7 nm HPC
8x DDR4-3200
2-way and 4-way Symmetric multiprocessing (SMP). Each socket has 3x Hydra ports with 240 Gbit/s per port (total of 720 Gbit/s per each socket interconnects)
40 PCIe 4.0 with CCIX support, 4x USB 3.0, 2x SATA 3.0, 8x SAS 3.0 and 2x 100 Gigabit Ethernet
100 to 200 W
Compression engine (GZIP, LZS, LZ4) capable of up to 40 Git/s compress and 100 Gbit/s decompress
Crypto offload engine (for AES, DES, 3DES, SHA1/2, etc..) capable of throughputs up to 100 Gbit/s
Kunpeng 930 (formerly Hi1630)
The Kunpeng 930 (formerly known as Hi1630) is HiSilicon's fifth-generation server processor announced in 2019 and scheduled for launch in 2021. It features:
TBD custom cores with higher frequencies, support for simultaneous multithreading (SMT) and ARM's Scalable Vector Extension (SVE).
64 KB L1-I, 64 KB L1-D, 512 KB Private L2 and 1 MB L3/core Shared
TSMC 5 nm
8x DDR5
Kunpeng 950
The Kunpeng 950 is HiSilicon's sixth-generation server processor announced in 2019 and scheduled for launch in 2023.
AI acceleration
HiSilicon also develops AI Acceleration chips.
Da Vinci architecture
Each Da Vinci Max AI Core features a 3D Cube Tensor Computing Engine (4096 FP16 MACs + 8192 INT8 MACs), Vector unit (2048bit INT8/FP16/FP32) and scalar unit. It includes a new AI framework called "MindSpore", a platform-as-a-service product called ModelArts, and a lower-level library called Compute Architecture for Neural Networks (CANN).
Ascend 310
The Ascend 310 is an AI inference SoC, it was codenamed Ascend-Mini. The Ascend 310 is capable of 16 TOPS@INT8 and 8 TOPS@FP16. The Ascend 310 features:
2x Da Vinci Max AI cores
8x ARM Cortex-A55 CPU cores
8 MB on-chip buffer
16 channel video decode – H.264/H.265
1 channel video encode – H.264/H.265
TSMC 12 nm FFC process
8 W
Ascend 910
The Ascend 910 is an AI training SoC, it was codenamed Ascend-Max. which delivers 256 TFLOPS@FP16 and 512 TOPS@INT8. The Ascend 910 features:
32x Da Vinci Max AI cores arranged in 4 clusters
1024-bit NoC Mesh @ 2 GHz, with 128 GB/s bandwidth Read/Write per core
3x 240 Gbit/s HCCS ports for Numa connections
2x 100 Gbit/s RoCE interfaces for networking
4x HBM2E, 1.2 TB/s bandwidth
3D-SRAM stacked below AI SoC die
1228 mm2 Total die size (456 mm2 Virtuvian AI SoC, 168 mm2 Nimbus V3 IO Die, 4x96 mm2 HBM2E, 2x110 mm2 Dummy Die)
32 MB on-chip buffer
128 channel video decode – H.264/H.265
TSMC 7+ nm EUV (N7+) process
350 W
The Ascend 910 Cluster has 1024–2048 Ascend 910 chips to reach 256–512 petaFLOPS@FP16. The Ascend 910 and Ascend Cluster will be available in Q2 2019.
See also
Semiconductor industry
Semiconductor industry in China
References
Fabless semiconductor companies
ARM architecture
Semiconductor companies of China
Companies based in Shenzhen
Chinese brands
Huawei
Chinese companies established in 2004
Microprocessors made in China