Opinionated - China Chipping Away to Semiconductor Dominance

[JSCh]

Huawei investment arm takes stake in Chinese EDA firm
Staff reporter, Shanghai; Rodney Chan, DIGITIMES
Wednesday 30 December 2020

The recent move by Hubble Technology Investment under Huawei to invest in NineCube, an electronic design automation (EDA) company in China, has been widely seen as the Chinese tech giant's bid to strengthen its chip design capabilities amid the US trade sanctions.

According to recent updates from qcc.com - a Chinese platform providing information about China-based enterprises - NineCube has undergone a business change, with Hubble Technology as a new shareholder. But the sum of investment from Hubble was not disclosed.

Founded in November 2011, NineCube is EDA service provider with Wang Xinchao - founder of China-based IC packaging firm JCET - on its board of directors.

At present, nearly 80% of the EDA market is occupied by US companies, mainly Synopsys, Cadence and Mentor Graphics.

 

[TaiShang]

BYD ot spin off semiconductor business for independent listing

2020-12-30 21:46:22 GMT+8 By: Phate
0 1

BYD's board of directors meeting held on December 30 agreed that its holding subsidiary, BYD Semiconductor Corporation, is planning to spin off and start the preparatory work for an independent listing.
BYD Semiconductor's main business includes the development, production, and sales of power semiconductors, intelligent control ICs, intelligent sensors, and optoelectronic semiconductors.

The company has an integrated business chain including chip design, wafer manufacturing, packaging and testing, and downstream applications.

After more than ten years of R&D accumulation and large-scale application in the field of new energy vehicles, BYD Semiconductor has become a leading manufacturer of independent and controllable automotive-grade IGBTs in China.

In the industrial IGBT field, BYD Semiconductor's downstream applications include industrial welding machines, inverters, home appliances, etc., which will bring new growth points for BYD Semiconductor.

In other business areas, BYD Semiconductor also has many years of R&D accumulation, sufficient technology reserves, and abundant product types, and has established long-term close business ties with customers from the automotive, consumer, and industrial sectors.
BYD holds 72.30% equity interest in BYD Semiconductor, and the list of shareholders also includes Hubei Xiaomi Yangtze River Industry Fund Partnership and Hubei Lenovo Yangtze River Technology Industry Fund Partnership.

Up to now, BYD Semiconductor has completed internal reorganization, equity incentive, the introduction of strategic investors, and other work, and has the basis for independent operation.

 

[JSCh]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1348831254762774528

World Affairs @Geopol2020

Wuhan-based semiconductor company makes huge progress in 3D NAND flash memory.

Yangtze Memory cranks up production of 64, 128 and 192-layer chips.

Samsung and Micron, beware! #China #technology

 

[Piotr]

China tech firm releases the world’s first RISC-V structured PC

By Tao Mingyang Published: Jan 14, 2021 04:18 PM

The world's first RISC-V single board PC Beagle-V based on Linux operation system was debuted by Shanghai tech firm StarFive on Wednesday. The computer was co-developed by StarFive, Shenzhen Seeed Studio and US SBC (single board computer) company Beagleboard, paper.com reported.

Beagle-V uses the domestic made SoC (system-on-a-chip) artificial intelligence vision processing chip by StarFive and can be used in areas of mechanical engineering, data center, artificial intelligence and cloud computing, said the report.

RISC stands for the Reduced Instruction Set Computer, which is a computer with a small, highly optimized set of instructions and with highly-improved operational efficiency. RISC-V is the fifth generation of the RISC.

Founder and CEO of StarFive Xu Taojin said that Beagle-V will meet industry requirements of demo board with high-performance, multifunction and low-cost. "Beagle-V has a small size of 85 millimeters multiple 70 milimeters and feature of energy saving, which is an ideal solution for single board computer," said Xu.

Geng Bo, deputy secretary-general of the China Solid State Lighting Alliance, told Global Times that RISC-V and ARM (Advanced RISC Machine) are two representative types of Reduced Instruction Set Computer invented in 1980s with most differences between two processors the design style and open source degree.

"Because ARM is not open source, the users of ARM have to adjust frequency and power dissipation of the products follow the original design of the ARM processor and to pay expensive license fee," said Geng.

Geng referred to the open source and zero license fees of RISC-V attracting more developers. "It's said that ARM had canceled license fees for the companies with financing amount lower than $5 million, to compete with its opponent RISC-V on the aspects of pricing," said Geng.

During the ceremony, officers of Shanghai government said the government will support the development of high technologies including RISC.

Beagle-V will start selling in March 2020 and will be opened to the broader market in the second half of 2021.

https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202101/1212799.shtml

 

[JSCh]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1349931678915915777

Global Times @globaltimesnews
China state-affiliated media

Chinese semiconductor equipment maker Advanced Micro-Fabrication Equipment Inc said in a filing with Shanghai Stock Exchange Friday that its addition to US blacklist of Chinese firms deemed to be linked to Chinese military has no substantial impact on production and operations.


12:09 PM · Jan 15, 2021

 

[JSCh]

China’s Crystal Clear Chemical Skyrockets on Arrival of ASML Chip Lithography Sets
ZHANG YUSHUO
DATE: 15 MINUTES AGO / SOURCE: YICAI

China’s Crystal Clear Chemical Skyrockets on Arrival of ASML Chip Lithography Sets​

(Yicai Global) Jan. 20 -- The roughly USD10 million worth of used lithography machinery Suzhou Crystal Clear Chemical bought four months ago to produce semiconductors has arrived, the company announced yesterday. Crystal Clear's shares [SHE:300655] closed 6.93 percent up at CNY36.67 (USD5.64) at the lunch break on the news.

The Chinese producer of chemical materials for the electronics industry announced the purchase of the argon fluoride laser equipment made by Netherlands-based ASM International from South Korea’s SK Hynix through Singapore-based electrical wholesaler Singtest Technology for USD11 million on Sept. 29, saying the purchase will push its research and development of high-end products. Its shares hit the Shenzhen bourse’s ChiNext Index’s 20 percent up limit the next day.

Lithography machines are key equipment for chip manufacturing.

"The equipment's installation project is set to end in the first half, and we are expected to finish technical specification related to the new technique of ArF photoresist products, finalize the products, and realize large-scale production in three years," Shanghai Securities News reported yesterday, citing the firm’s Chairman Wu Tianshu. China-made photoresist will be able to basically meet the requirements of 45 nanometer to 28nm process technology and manufacturing techniques with the industrialization of the ArF photoresist, Wu said.

The costs of the deal include the equipment purchase price, commissions, taxes and fees incurred in transferring its title, the firm said in September.

Photoresist is light-sensitive liquid made up of a photosensitive resin, sensitizer and solvent that uses a photochemical reaction to transfer a fine pattern onto a substrate via exposure by ultraviolet light, electron beam, excimer laser beam, X-ray or ion beam.

It mainly includes printed circuit board chemicals and those for liquid crystal displays and semiconductors. World chip technology is now at the micro-nano level, with an ultraviolet wavelength. Japan and the US essentially monopolize the core technologies of these two types of photoresists.

Veldhoven, Netherlands-based ASML Holding makes machinery used to produce integrated circuits. It is the world's biggest supplier of photolithography equipment to the semiconductor sector. Icheon-si-based Hynix is a memory semiconductor supplier of dynamic random-access memory chips and flash memory chips. It is the globe's second-biggest memory chipmaker and the world's third-largest microprocessor producer.​

 

[j20blackdragon]

China Debuts First 7nm Data Center GPU To Rival Nvidia, AMD

Ready for prime time

www.tomshardware.com

New Chinese 7nm GPU rivals Nvidia and AMD for performance

But it’s only for data centres, for now…

www.pcgamer.com

 

[tower9]

China Debuts First 7nm Data Center GPU To Rival Nvidia, AMD

Ready for prime time

www.tomshardware.com

New Chinese 7nm GPU rivals Nvidia and AMD for performance

But it’s only for data centres, for now…

www.pcgamer.com

If domestic companies do not choose these over nvidia, that means they haven’t learned shit from Trump.

 

[JSCh]

Somewhat on topic?

Android has been ported to a RISC-V board

Android is being ported to hardware based on the RISC-V architecture, an alternative ISA to x86 and ARM without licensing or royalty fees.

www.xda-developers.com

 

[JSCh]

Shanghai adds chips to its priority list along with Tesla, digital yuan

Shanghai wants to roll out 12-nanometre chips this year as part of an ambitious effort to strengthen domestic production and cut reliance on imported semiconductors.

www.scmp.com

 

[JustAnotherPerson]

Really interesting work the chinese are doing in developing EUV light sources.

Research and development of lithography machine: Harbin Institute of Technology is never absent in the country's urgent need
Harbin Institute of Technology has never been absent in the country's urgent need, and now the country urgently needs lithography machines. The emergence of the DPP-EUV light source of Harbin Institute of Technology is really an epic achievement. First-class universities should have the world's top level. This is the result of decades of accumulation of Harbin Institute of Technology in the field of ultra-precision machining and ultra-precision measurement!
A breakthrough has already been made in the lens and exposure system required by the lithography machine where the Changchun Opto-Mechanics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences is located, and the latest news also shows that the laboratory where Changchun Opto-Mechanics has built a set of EUV light source equipment.The Changchun Institute of Optics and Mechanics is developing EUV exposure machine based on Harbin Institute of Technology DPP-EUV light source, which is expected to be launched within two years. The two core components of the lithography machine are the dual workpiece stage and the exposure system.

EUV lithography is called extreme ultraviolet lithography (Extreme Ultra-violet), and there are two main types of light sources:
1. One is DPP-EUV extreme ultraviolet light source. Discharge excited plasma EUV extreme ultraviolet light source
The Dutch ASML lithography machine company and Harbin Institute of Technology are all researching this kind.
The DPP EUV light source uses discharge to make the load (Xe or Sn) form plasma, radiates ultraviolet rays, and uses a multilayer mirror to reflect and purify the energy spectrum to obtain 1 EUV light.

The advantages of the DPP EUV light source are high energy conversion efficiency for EUV generation and low cost; the disadvantage is that the electrode heat load is high, there are many fragments, the mechanism is complicated, the optical device is easily damaged, and the light collection angle is small.

2. Laser plasma light source (LPP)
The LPP EUV system mainly includes lasers, convergent lenses, loads, light collectors, masks, projection optical systems and chips.
The principle is to use a high-power laser to heat a load (Xe or Sn) to form plasma, which radiates ultraviolet rays, and uses a multilayer mirror to reflect and purify the energy spectrum to obtain 1 EUV light.
The advantages of the LPP EUV light source are the small size of the light source, fewer types of debris or particles, high light collection efficiency, and easier amplification of EUV output power. Of course, it also has shortcomings, mainly because the system design is complicated and expensive.
These 2 kinds of light sources. Harbin Institute of Technology researched 15 years ago!

Two main units of China's research on EUV extreme ultraviolet light source:
1. Harbin Institute of Technology National Key Laboratory of Tunable Laser Technology.
2. Shanghai Institute of Optics and Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (a researcher who graduated from Harbin Institute of Technology is responsible for the project, deputy director. One of the responsible persons of Shenguang 2).The major breakthroughs made by Harbin Institute of Technology are:The discharge excites the plasma EUV extreme ultraviolet light source. It is the same EUV extreme ultraviolet light source with the Dutch ASML Lithography Machine Company. But it will take 2 years to make it a lithography machine!For the Dutch lithography machine, the extreme ultraviolet light source is currently produced in the United States, and some main components are produced in Germany and other countries, and the cleaning components are produced by Lanying equipment. If the 3-5nm lithography machine is made domestically within two years, Huawei will be saved! Harbin Institute of Technology is unparalleled in the world!The following is the world's leading result. Also from the laboratory of Harbin Institute of Technology.

The fabrication development of DPP source collector for EUVL in Harbin Institute of Technology

This paper introduces a new processing technique for discharge produced plasma source collector of EUV Lithography in Harbin Institute of Technology. The main idea is using the ultra-precision diamond lathe to process the inner and outer surfaces of the mirror. The mirror substratum's material...

ieeexplore.ieee.org

 

[Piotr]

Huawei, SMIC to Join Chipmaking Standards Group as China Pushes Foreign Tech Decoupling in Trade War
Asia & Pacific
13:10 GMT 29.01.2021Get short URL

by Demond Cureton

90 members have been established in the committee, including Huawei Technologies, Shanghai-based chipmaker SMIC, Huawei's semiconductor wing, HiSilicon, as well as tech giants Tencent Holding, Xiaomi Corp and Alibaba Group Holdings, among others, the report said.
Experts from China's public and private sector are joining forces to standardise the mainland semiconductor market to protect national supply chain lines in the ongoing US trade war on China, the South China Morning Post reported on Friday.
The China Electronics Standardisation Institute (CESI) proposed the plans, which would "support and guarantee the healthy development of the integrated circuit (IC) industry", a Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) statement read as quoted by the SCMP, adding public consultations on the proposal would conclude at the end of February.

China's rapid progress in IC technologies had surpassed standardisation frameworks in chip designs, packaging, testing and other benchmarks as set by the International Electrotechnical Commission (ICE) in recent years, CESI added.

“Many domestic companies have launched their own artificial intelligence chips, but there is no unified performance evaluation standard,” the statement read.

According to CESI, a lack of standards causes difficulties to keeping "an orderly industrial environment" due to rising communication costs between semiconductor firms and customers.

“As the foundation and core of the information industry, the IC industry occupies a pivotal position in the national economy and social development,” CESI said, adding national security was was supported by a strategic industry.

China Vows To Decouple From Foreign Tech As US Reviews Trump-Era Restrictions
The efforts come days after a top Communist Party official wrote China vowed to adopt a "whole country" approach to decoupling from foreign technologies despite challenges from a technological gap and foreign sanctions in the trade war.

The announcement came months after China pledged $1.4tn to build its mainland technologies, including infrastructure, artificial intelligence, 5G, green energy and numerous others, in a bid to reduce dependence on key foreign imports.

US president Joe Biden later postponed an executive order launched in November to 27 May to review Trump's trade war on China, which blacklisted Chinese firms in recent years, citing alleged ties to the Communist Party and military, sending bilateral ties to historic lows.

SEMI, a major association of global chipmakers, including Samsung Electronics, Intel, Micron Technologies and others, urged the US president in an open letter to reassess the export restrictions on Chinese firms from Trump's administration.

The letter called on Biden's team to review restrictions on Huawei Technologies, SMIC and other Chinese firms and prioritise backlogged trade licences or risk damaging US innovation and subjecting firms to retaliatory measures from Beijing.

Donald Trump's administration added over 70 Chinese tech firms to an Entity List in May 2019, citing national security risks, sparking criticism from Chinese companies and officials who denied the allegations. Further restrictions were slapped on mainland tech companies weeks ahead of Trump being voted out of office.

https://sputniknews.com/asia/202101...-pushes-foreign-tech-decoupling-in-trade-war/

MAGA!

 

[fallstuff]

You gotta do what you gotta do.

 

[TaiShang]

Chinese appliance giant Midea sets up semiconductor company - CnTechPost

The company was established on January 26 with a registered capital of RMB 20 million yuan ($3 million).

cntechpost.com

Chinese appliance giant Midea has invested in the establishment of a semiconductor technology company, Meiken Semiconductor Technology Co.

The company was established on January 26 with a registered capital of RMB 20 million yuan ($3 million).

The company's business scope includes electronic component manufacturing, electronic component retailing, integrated circuit chip and product manufacturing, integrated circuit chip and product sales, semiconductor discrete device manufacturing, semiconductor discrete device sales, transformer, rectifier and inductor manufacturing, integrated circuit manufacturing, and advanced power electronic device sales.

In the last decade, the semiconductor industry has become an investment hotspot in China, with Tsinghua Unigroup topping the list of the decade with a single financing amount of RMB 150 billion.

In 2020, there were 458 investment and financing events in this industry, with a total amount of RMB 109.769 billion, ranking second in both the number and amount of investment and financing in the past decade. The highest financing amount was taken by SMIC, with a total of $19.85 billion.

In a globalized world, although China uses more than half of all chips, China's own semiconductor industry is still very weak.


The compensatory development of Chinese semiconductors to ensure the security of the supply chain is indeed an important factor in this wave of semiconductor start-ups. The security of the supply chain makes the development of China's chip industry a necessity.

The future trend of a digital society constructed by AI + 5G + IoT gives nascent Chinese chip companies the possibility of development and triggers a wave of investment in the semiconductor industry.

 

[TaiShang]

Zhonghuan Semiconductor to Build USD1.9 Billion Large-Size Silicon Wafer Plant

TANG SHIHUA
DATE: AN HOUR AGO
/ SOURCE: YICAI

Zhonghuan Semiconductor to Build USD1.9 Billion Large-Size Silicon Wafer Plant

(Yicai Global) Feb. 2 -- Shares in Zhonghuan Semiconductor, a leading Chinese silicon wafer manufacturer, gained today on plans to invest CNY12 billion (USD1.9 billion) to build a solar wafer production base in northwestern China that can produce 210mm-diameter wafers, one of the largest sizes available that are just coming onto the market.

Zhonghuan Semiconductor’s share price [SHE:002129] closed up 1.84 percent at CNY28.29 (USD4.38) today.

The new factory, which will be located at the Yinchuan Economic and Technological Development Zone in the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, will have an annual output of 50 gigawatts, nearly triple its current production capacity of large-size wafers, Zhonghuan Semiconductor said.

Recent technological advancements have enabled the size of silicon wafers to get bigger. This has obvious advantages and can help cut costs for mid- and downstream battery and module makers as well as power station operators. Zhonghuan Semiconductor is expected to build only 210mm wafer plants in the next few years.

Once completed, the Tianjin-based firm will have a total annual production capacity of 135 gigawatts of monocrystalline silicon wafers, it said. The Ningxia government will subsidize electricity and provide other forms of support, it added.