Word is China's been banning iPhones everywhere - nuclear power plants, hospitals in Inner Mongolia, you name it. Employees are saying it's to stop U.S. spying through iOS security holes. These informal bans go back years for some agencies. It's Beijing's way of telling $AAPL and other American companies that tech restrictions are getting real intense real fast amid the sour relations with Washington. For Apple, it's gotta be pretty concerning given China's like 15% of their revenue. With how things are going between the superpowers, $AAPL's gonna have a heck of a time thriving in that vital market. As tensions rise, the iPhone maker faces new hurdles to keep growing in China. What's next?
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Analysis by TechInsights of the new Huawei Mate 60 Pro smartphone reveals it contains a HiSilicon Kirin 9000s application processor manufactured using SMIC's enhanced 7nm (N+2) process technology. This demonstrates Huawei and China's continued resilience and technological progress in semiconductor design and manufacturing despite US trade restrictions. The Kirin 9000s chip is about 2% larger than the previous version but shows advancements like logic gate pitch shrinkage that bring SMIC's process closer to competitors' 7nm nodes, all without using EUV lithography. This semiconductor achievement could help revive Huawei's smartphone sales but may also prompt further technology restrictions from other concerned countries.