File photo: A pedestrian walks past a Huawei store in Sydney, Australia, May 23, 2019. Photo: Xinhua

Speculation about Huawei's foray into the manufacture of lithography machines, which lie at the core of chip fabrication, has begun to stir up discussion recently, after the besieged Chinese tech giant was found to have posted an ad for lithography technology engineers.

A job posting for lithography technology talent in Songshan Lake in Dongguan, a one-hour drive away from the firm's headquarters in Shenzhen, was shown on the Chinese recruitment marketplace liepin.com, according to a screenshot that was circulated on Chinese social media.

A search by the Global Times on the job hunting platform on Sunday revealed that hiring for the position has since stopped.

Huawei did not respond to a request for comment as of press time.

The reported recruitment coincides with the decision by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) to stop supplying its chips to Huawei under pressure from the US' sanctions. 

TSMC, the world's top contract chipmaker and vital Huawei supplier, said in mid-July while announcing its second quarter earnings that it had stopped taking any new orders from Huawei in May and plans to halt wafer shipments to Huawei after September 14. 

The Trump administration announced new restrictions in mid-May to ban Huawei and its suppliers from using US technology and software in an escalation of the US' tech battle with China.

A license is required in accordance with the US' rule for new orders from Huawei and its affiliates starting on May 15, and shipments of existing orders must be completed by September 14. 

TSMC did not disclose whether it would apply for a license to continue supplying to Huawei.

It is likely that Huawei is building a talent pool for chipmaking as part of its emergency response, Han Xiaomin, general manager of CCID Consulting's integrated circuit business, told the Global Times on Sunday.

However, it's unrealistic for the company to swiftly create new facilities by simply poaching valuable talent, as the chipmaking prowess of established manufactures is something that could not be easily toppled, Han said, noting that it would be easier for Huawei to forge a partnership with the current heavyweights in the industry to advance its semiconductor ambitions. 

Statistics from industry consultancy TrendForce showed that TSMC sat atop of the global foundry rankings as measured by revenue in the first quarter, with a 54.1 percent share of the global market, followed by Samsung with 15.9 percent and GlobalFoundries with 7.7 percent.

Two Chinese mainland chipmakers made the top 10 list, with Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp accounting for 4.5 percent of the global market share and Shanghai Huahong (Group) Co making up 1.1 percent. 

China remains far behind in the arena of lithography machines. ASML, the Netherlands-based front-end lithography dominator, which relies on its key customer TSMC for success, announced earlier this year that it had made significant progress on its multi-beam inspectional tool line, suitable for process nodes five nanometers and beyond. 

By contrast, Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment (SMEE) said in June that it expects the first homemade 28nm immersion type lithography to be delivered in 2021-22. SMEE has achieved mass-production capacity of 90nm process nodes. 

Global Times