[News] Huawei’s 5nm Kunpeng 930 Leak Raises Big Question: TSMC or SMIC Behind it?

Huawei’s first server CPU, the Kunpeng 920, was introduced in 2019, built on the Arm architecture and the 7nm process. Since then, the industry has closely tracked speculation about its successor, and details have now begun to surface. According to Wccftech, X platform user @Kurnalsalts says they have acquired Huawei’s new Kunpeng 930 server chip and conducted an extensive teardown, revealing significant generational advancements, as the report notes.

As TechPowerUp highlights, the Kunpeng 930 reportedly integrates dense compute tiles manufactured on TSMC’s 5nm node with a large I/O die produced at SMIC on a more mature process, possibly 14nm. This hybrid approach, the report notes, enables Huawei to pursue higher SRAM density and core scaling where needed, while assigning I/O and routing to a foundry that can handle volume production and ease supply constraints.

Some sources, however, suggest a different manufacturer, as highlighted by Chinese outlet NetEase News. MyDrivers further notes that SMIC’s N+3 process reportedly achieves notable transistor density—between TSMC’s N6 and Samsung’s 5nm nodes, roughly equivalent to TSMC’s 5.5nm level.

Rumored Details of Huawei’s Kunpeng 930: Packaging, Architecture, and Connectivity

Meanwhile, in terms of packaging, Wccftech notes that the chip measures about 77.5mm × 58.0mm, a relatively large size driven by Huawei’s chiplet design, which combines four compute dies with one large I/O die. As the report highlights, the I/O die in this successor is approximately 81.26% larger than that of the Kunpeng 920.

The Kunpeng 930 is reportedly built with a total of 120 cores. Each die carries 2MB of L2 cache and shares 91MB of L3 cache. In addition, it reportedly adopts Huawei’s “Mount TaiShan” architecture, built on ARM, Wccftech notes.

As for connectivity, the Kunpeng 930 provides 96 PCIe lanes, supports 16-channel DDR5 memory, and is designed for a dual-socket motherboard platform, enabling dual-CPU configurations, as Wccftech indicates.

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(Photo credit: Huawei)