China’s largest foundry Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC) has taken everyone by surprise with a dramatic ascent to the 7-nm process node despite its lack of access to ASML’s extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) technology due to U.S. restrictions placed in late 2020. The U.S. export control restrictions imply that fabs in China cannot fabricate semiconductors at 10 nm and beyond. The Shanghai-based fab is widely known to have accomplished 14-nm FinFET technology, which puts it two generations behind 7 nm and roughly four years behind the most advanced process nodes offered by TSMC and Samsung. But that has suddenly changed...