Chinese chip firms post record high revenue on AI boom, U.S. curbs
China is focusing on large language models in the artificial intelligence space.
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Chinese semiconductor firms have reported record revenue last year driven by AI demand, a shortage of memory chips and U.S. export restrictions that have pushed Beijing to bolster its homegrown tech industry.
Analysts and the companies themselves are also expecting further revenue surges this year, underscoring how Chinese chip players are capitalizing on strong demand from domestic tech giants looking to build their AI infrastructure.
U.S. export restrictions on China’s tech sector over the last few years have added “rocket fuel” on chip demand, amplifying growth from other areas like electric vehicles and AI data centers, according to Paul Triolo, a partner at Albright Stonebridge Group.
Semiconductor Manufacturing International Co. (SMIC), China’s largest chip manufacturer, said revenue for 2025 rose 16% from a year ago to a record $9.3 billion. Revenue could top $11 billion in 2026, according to LSEG analyst estimates.
Hua Hong, another Chinese chipmaker, said fourth-quarter revenue came in at a record $659.9 million and forecast sales of between $650 million and $660 million.
Moore Threads, which is aiming to rival Nvidia, guided that 2025 revenue would be between 1.45 billion yuan ($209.8 million) and 1.52 billion yuan, a 231% to 247% year-on-year increase.
What is driving sales records?
There are multiple factors at play. The growth of electric vehicles and related infrastructure has provided support for less-advanced or “mature node” semiconductors, while demand for more advanced chips is “through the roof because of AI,” Triolo told CNBC.
U.S. restrictions over the past few years, which cut off China from key technologies, have accelerated a self-sufficiency push from Beijing to wean itself off American tech.
More recently, U.S. export curbs on Nvidia’s chips to China has prompted Beijing to encourage local firms to buy domestic alternatives, with companies like Huawei stepping in to fill the void, even if the performance of their semiconductors lags the U.S.
“While China does not yet lead in peak GPU performance, these homegrown solutions are filling the domestic ‘compute gap’ and driving record revenues,” Parv Sharma, senior analyst at Counterpoint Research, told CNBC.
Memory chip players in China have also seen a boost. Memory, a key component for AI data centers and consumer electronics, is in short supply globally while demand remains high. This has led to an unprecedented spike in prices of memory chips.
ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT), one of China’s leading memory players, saw a 130% year-on-year jump in revenue to more than 55 billion yuan ($8 billion), Bloomberg reported last week, citing people familiar with the matter.
High-bandwidth memory (HBM) is a type of high-end memory required for AI. The market is dominated by the world’s three biggest players in the space who make this type of memory — Samsung, SK Hynix…
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