[News] Samsung Foundry Reportedly in Talks With Chinese Carmakers Like BYD for 2nm, 4nm Autonomous Driving SoCs - TrendForce

According to reports from *Seoul Economic Daily* and *EE Times China*, Samsung Foundry is reportedly in talks with major Chinese automakers, including BYD, to produce autonomous driving system-on-chip... Read original →

Samsung Foundry’s outreach to Chinese automakers for 2nm/4nm autonomous driving SoCs is a calculated geopolitical arbitrage—leveraging the 'non-sensitive' perception of automotive chips to access high-performance AI markets amid U.S. export controls. This pressures SMIC to accelerate GAA development, though its 7nm yield and lack of EUV tools remain hard ceilings. Compliance risks loom: if Samsung produces AI-training-capable SoCs for BYD, U.S. BIS may reclassify them under supercomputing restrictions, inflating supply chain insurance costs. TSMC could counter with N3P automotive certification to lock in Tesla and NIO. Meanwhile, Chinese tech giants like Alibaba and Baidu will likely adopt dual-track strategies—custom architectures paired with multi-source foundry partnerships. Within 18 months, automotive AI chips will become the new flashpoint in global semiconductor regulation, where 2nm capacity allocation translates directly into autonomy standard-setting power.