[tooltalk]

>> Sub-10nm don't make much money <<

sigh the cutting edge nodes get the vast majority of chip making revenue/profit.

>> China can't produce sub-10nm (or any node invented in the past 20 years) anyway without western help <<

China's SMIC already has 7nm, though efficiency, cost-effectiveness and yield are still unknown. As late as 2022, the US dept of commerce granted over $100B worth of licenses to China! so they got all tooling and lithos they need to make 7nm, or even 5nm, though they would be very expensive and poor yield.

>> and they won't catch up because all they're good at is copying <<

China could catch up organically, just probably not this decade, or next. The Japanese equipment makers such as TEL and the Dutch DUV/EUV maker, ASML, can still sell their equipments to China no problem; just not the most cutting edge stuff.