Huawei has unveiled the Kirin 950 Pro, a new processor it says is entirely free of US technology, powering its latest three-screen folding phone. The chip uses Huawei's own LinxiCore processor cores, GPU and neural processing unit, alongside a "Tau Scaling" architecture that packs components more tightly to boost performance without relying on advanced manufacturing processes from the likes of TSMC or Intel. The launch matters as part of China's broader push towards technological self-sufficiency, though analysts remain sceptical that Huawei has achieved any genuine breakthrough rather than an incremental engineering gain.

Huawei claims the new chip delivers 42 percent more performance than last year's model, and it features in the $2,979 Mate XT2 handset. Counterpoint Research expects Huawei to hold 24 percent of the folding phone market by the end of 2026, a niche that made up just 1.6 percent of smartphone sales last year; the launch also comes days before Apple is expected to unveil its own folding iPhone, tipped to capture 25 percent of that market. Huawei also highlighted that its HarmonyOS now runs on 85 million devices, though this remains a small slice of the global market, and the company has not indicated whether the new chip technology will be applied beyond phones to challenge firms such as AMD, Intel or Nvidia more broadly.