Chinese semiconductor industry

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Tam

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Its easy to lose your shirt over DRAM and NAND, so this is not good news if you have investment on semiconductor.
 

Tam

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I'd like to know what is China's answer to NVIDIA hegemony - GPU's specifically. AI push requires GPU's as they have the ability to run the algorithms on individual cores delivering better results.

NVIDIA success was because of its coupling with AI.

Ask Google. You don't need GPU for AI. nVidia is trying to be relevant by pushing its GPUs for this purpose. You need neural networks.

China has its own GPU maker, but its work has been confined to the military, like for use in displays. I forgot the name, but lately they have come out on their own for commercial products.
 

AndrewS

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Hi OppositeDay, daifo, weigh2000,

So all discussion we had with WTAN, latenlazy, KYli, machupicu and others , one by one had come to fruition, here are some of the list. hopefully more will be unveil in 2021.

1) Huawei 45nm FABS online this year..... check

2) SMIC 28nm FABS SMEE 28NM DUVL) online early/mid 2021..... check

3) Huawei 28 FABS(SMEE 28NM DUVL) online late 2021/early 2022...... check

4) initial mass production 7nm SMIC N+1 mid 2021.....check

5) SMIC 7nm N+2 late 2021 intro with 2022 mass production ..... TBA?

6) EUVL with DPP 2021.....TBA?

You need to add the FT reference which reports Huawei targeting 20nm chips by late-2022.
 

AndrewS

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The empire strikes back ;)

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" The fabrication facility is expected to start with the manufacture of low-end 45nm chips, the paper said on Sunday, citing people familiar with the project. Huawei aims to make 28nm chips for “Internet of things” devices by the end of 2021, and produce 20nm chips for 5G telecom equipment by late 2022, the report said. "


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The project, first reported by Chinese newspaper Caixin last month, could also jump-start China’s ambitions to shake off its dependency on foreign chip technology, particularly from the US, which wants to slow China’s development as a technology power.
"

I'll post the full article below, which has more tidbits.

Huawei develops plan for chip plant to help beat US sanctions
Shanghai facility aimed at breaking Chinese company’s dependence on American technology



Huawei is working on plans for a dedicated chip plant in Shanghai that would not use American technology, enabling it to secure supplies for its core telecom infrastructure business despite US sanctions.

Two people briefed on the project said the plant would be run by a partner, Shanghai IC R&D Center, a chip research company backed by the Shanghai Municipal government.

Industry experts said the project could help Huawei, which has no experience in fabricating chips, chart a path to long-term survival.

US export controls imposed in May and tightened in August leverage American companies’ dominance of certain chip-manufacturing equipment and chip-design software to block semiconductor supplies to Huawei.

Industry experts said the planned local facility would be a potential new source for semiconductors after stocks of imported chips Huawei has been accumulating since last year ran out.

The fabrication plant will initially experiment with making low-end 45nm chips, a technology global leaders in chipmaking started using 15 years ago.

But Huawei wants to make more advanced 28nm chips by the end of next year, according to chip industry engineers and executives familiar with the project. Such a plan would allow Huawei to make smart TVs and other “internet of things” devices.

Huawei then aims to produce 20nm chips by late 2022, which could be used to make most of its 5G telecoms equipment and allow that business to continue even with the US sanctions.

“The planned new production line will not help with the smartphone business since chipsets needed for smartphones need to be produced at more advanced technology nodes,” said a semiconductor industry executive briefed on the plans.

“But if it succeeds, it can become a bridge to a sustainable future for their infrastructure business, in combination with the inventory they have built and which should last for two years or so,” he said.

“They possibly can do it, in maybe two years,” said Mark Li, a semiconductor analyst at Bernstein in Hong Kong.

He added that while the chips Huawei needed for making mobile network base stations would ideally be made on 14nm or more advanced process technology, using 28nm was possible.

“Huawei can make up for the shortcomings on the software and system side,” he said. Chinese producers could tolerate higher costs and operational inefficiencies than their offshore competitors.

The project, first reported by Chinese newspaper Caixin last month, could also jump-start China’s ambitions to shake off its dependency on foreign chip technology, particularly from the US, which wants to slow China’s development as a technology power.

Huawei has already been investing in the domestic semiconductor sector, especially among smaller operators, a chip industry executive said.

“Huawei has strong abilities in chip design, and we are very happy to help a trustworthy supply chain develop its capabilities in chip manufacturing, equipment and materials. Helping them is helping ourselves,” rotating chairman Guo Ping told journalists in September.

According to chip engineers and industry executives, Huawei plans to eventually equip its domestic production exclusively with Chinese-made machinery. But analysts caution that such a goal is several years away.

“Such a facility would most likely run on a combination of equipment from different Chinese suppliers such as AMEC and Naura, plus some used foreign tools which they can find in the market,” Mr Li said.

He added that manufacturing chips in such an environment would be less efficient and more costly. But Huawei could afford this because the volume of the semiconductors needed for base stations was much lower than for a mass product like smartphones.

Huawei and ICRD declined to comment on the plans for the production facility.

“You will not obtain any information from us here, we cannot give you anything,” said Huang Yin, an ICRD spokeswoman. “This is rather sensitive.”

A major shareholder of ICRD is state-owned Huahong Group, which also controls contract chipmakers Huahong Grace and HLMC.
 

ansy1968

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I love how BYD had a dig on LENOVO, your a half baked wannabe Chinese, a Banana.....hehehe :cool: go go BYD give them hell.

from cnTechPost
BYD's notebook proves broad prospects for China's core technology
2020-11-01 20:53:03 GMT+8 | cnTechPost
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BYD's notebook proves broad prospects for China's core technology-cnTechPost

BYD has always been full of confidence in the development of China's domestic core technology, its founder Wang Chuanfu said recently that "chips are man-made, not God-made".
Recently BYD launched a purely domestic notebook, with practical action to prove the broad prospects of domestic core technology.

The most special thing about this laptop, which is designed and manufactured by BYD, is that it is 100% made in China.
From the appearance of the design, body materials, to the internal core of the CPU, GPU, operating system, every component of this laptop, every function, all come from the independent research and development of domestic enterprises, not dependent on any foreign companies.
While it's surprising that BYD was able to launch such a laptop, it's not much of a crossover operation.
Even ignoring its decade-long history of supplying and assembling laptop components, BYD started producing its own laptops for internal employees a few years ago.
Of course, the birth of these purely domestic notebook computers, BYD's design, production capacity alone is not enough, CPU, GPU, and other core components of the supply is more critical, and these inseparable from other domestic manufacturers of support.


How to achieve 100% localization?
As a typical form of portable PC (personal computer), the core components of a notebook computer usually come from different manufacturers.
In the case of dependence on an external supply of core components, notebook design, production capacity, in fact, is equivalent to the ability to assemble, although there is a certain amount of technical content, but is far from the core technology.
In the past, Lenovo, Shenzhou, and other domestic notebook manufacturers have made a name for themselves with their strong design and production capabilities, and Lenovo has even occupied the world's first sales for many years, but its core components are highly dependent on foreign manufacturers to supply.
For example, the processor comes from Intel or AMD; the graphics card is a core graphics card from Intel or AMD or a discrete graphics card from AMD or NVIDIA; the memory comes from Magnesium or Kingston, and the hard drive comes from Samsung or Western Digital.
Obviously, the core technology of such a laptop is not autonomous, and the degree of localization is not really high. Is a product of the global supply chain, once Intel, NVIDIA, and other core components manufacturers pinch supply, Lenovo these laptop manufacturers can only scratch blind.
On the other hand, BYD launched a purely domestic laptop, although also assembled from different core components, the supplier is a domestic company, this difference will bring about a fundamental difference.

The processor in BYD's laptop is Loongson 3A4000, the graphics card is Jingjia Microelectronics JM7201, and it supports Loongson OS and domestic operating systems like KirinOS and UOS MIPS versions.
This can completely get rid of the dependence on foreign giants such as Intel, NVIDIA, Microsoft, if there is also ChangXin Memory and Yangtze Memory hard drive, 100% localization can be achieved.
Of course, there are at least two conditions to achieve domestic substitution. The other condition is that it must be available. BYD launched the laptop, apparently can also meet this condition.

Nationalization of the PC road has been through
In terms of overall configuration, this Loongson laptop from BYD has been able to meet the multi-scenario needs of the daily office. Although there is still a gap compared to the high-end laptops in the market, it is fully up to the usable standard.
This laptop is equipped with a Loongson 3A4000 quad-core processor clocked at 1.5GHz, which is fully capable of most office and entertainment scenario computing jobs.
Jingjia Microelectronics JM7201 This discrete graphics card is relatively weak in terms of graphics computing power, but it is also capable of meeting most audio and entertainment needs.
Of course, judging from the specs related to this laptop configuration, the BYD Loongson laptop is not outstanding, and if the price doesn't surprise you, this laptop won't be very competitive in the market.

Regardless of the market performance, however, the launch of this BYD Loongson laptop is at least the completion of the leap from 0 to 1.
It shows that we have our own mature alternatives in some PC-related core components and core technology areas. With the GS464v micro-architecture of the Loongson 3A4000 processor and the Loongson OS, Kirin OS, and UOS MIPS versions of these home-grown operating systems, there is an ever-innovating technology ecosystem flourishing.
All indications are that the road to a localized PC, which countless aspiring individuals have been striving for, is already clear. What's more exciting is that the gap between the domestic technology and products and the international advanced level is narrowing at a visible speed.


The gap is narrowing
The most important core component of the BYD Loongson laptop, of course, is the Loongson 3A4000 processor, which uses the 28nm FDSOI process, limited by a more backward process, the performance can only be said to be unsatisfactory.
The next generation of the Loongson 3A4000, the Loongson 3A5000, was recently confirmed to use the SMIC 12nm process and has been successfully completed in the third quarter.
If mass production can be achieved next year, then the Loongson 3A5000 will have the opportunity to close the gap with the international advanced level in terms of process, after all, the CPU market leader Intel, the latest 11th generation Core Tiger Lake also uses a 10nm process.
In addition to the process, the Loongson 3A4000's GS464V core is comparable to AMD's original Zen architecture, and the Loongson 3A5000's core will be based on the GS464V for further upgrades.
In recent years, AMD's revolutionary "Zen" series architecture has brought a good turnaround in the CPU market, putting tremendous pressure on Intel. It is believed that Loongson, based on the GS464 series of cores, is also continuously improving its competitiveness.

In short, along with the release of the BYD Loongson laptop, the technical achievements in the field of domestic CPU, GPU, operating system, etc. have been further demonstrated.
What is certain is that, at least in the field of core PC-related technologies, China's independent process has taken a step forward and the gap between China and the international advanced level is no longer far.
The technical achievements in the field of PC-related, the impact of the scope is not limited to the PC market, the significance of the realization of PC localization should not be underestimated.

The significance of pure domestic PC
Although the transition from the PC Internet era to the mobile Internet era has been completed and the global PC market has experienced several years of declining sales, this does not mean that PC devices are no longer important. Quite the contrary, the current PC equipment, and PC-related technology, the importance of the rise rather than fall.

On the one hand, the PC market has begun to pick up.IDC data show that in 2019, the global PC market bottomed out, the annual PC shipments reached 267 million units, an increase of 2.74% year-on-year.
And in the first half of this year, Covid-19 led to a surge in demand for work at home and online education, further accelerating the recovery of the global PC market.
On the other hand, PCs and servers are highly correlated. Work from home, online education demand rose, but also further stimulate cloud services, data center demand rose, which in turn brought a large number of new orders for the server market.
Coincidentally, both the PC market and the server market are benefiting from these companies Intel and Samsung.
This is because although PCs and servers are very different in terms of architecture and functionality, the most basic technical principles are not much different.

So after the launch of purely domestic PCs, the future of the domestic server variation is also very promising.
Among the technological changes already set off by new technologies such as cloud computing, big data, IoT, artificial intelligence, etc., a high degree of server participation is indispensable.
 

TD739

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Huawei plans to have 45nm up and running by year end?

It's officially entering November!

2 more months.
 

TD739

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The biggest hoax in China semiconductor history when a Chinese guy who worked as test engineer in US Motorola faked as the chief designer for DSP chip went back to China to swindled millions in funding from government. Confidence and pride was shattered since then. Only recently that ghost was purged.

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ansy1968

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hi TD739,

An excerpt from AndrewS post


Huawei and ICRD declined to comment on the plans for the production facility.

“You will not obtain any information from us here, we cannot give you anything,” said Huang Yin, an ICRD spokeswoman. “This is rather sensitive.”

A major shareholder of ICRD is state-owned Huahong Group, which also controls contract chipmakers Huahong Grace and HLMC.

Now all Chinese tech company will be tight lipped as not to arouse the US, we are lucky we had members here who can give us some info.
 
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ougoah

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The biggest hoax in China semiconductor history when a Chinese guy who worked as test engineer in US Motorola faked as the chief designer for DSP chip went back to China to swindled millions in funding from government. Confidence and pride was shattered since then. Only recently that ghost was purged.

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But how is this snippet relevant at all? You realise this is simply a fraudster from 2006 right and the article over a decade old? Does the presence of one fraudster nearly 20 years ago have any bearing on what China's domestic chip industry is capable of now? Well it appears China made strides since then even sitting on its own hands until last year.

Let's remember this guy simply fooled some people in the Chinese government for a short while. He's a better example of dodgy characters trying to gain some advantage on technically illiterate government officials than proof that the CCP is giving anyone and everyone millions for claims. Because he is a fraudster doesn't mean others in the industry don't actually have capabilities. Fast forward to 2020 and it's clear that China was quite a lot more capable than everyone thought it was. It's come a LONG way since then and it's only really focused on this issue very recently. So if all what we have now could be accomplished with relative ease and resources spread thinner than it will be, I don't think it'll take long to catch up.
 
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Mt1701d

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Huawei plans to have 45nm up and running by year end?

It's officially entering November!

2 more months.
Well this whole sanction and chip cut off thing has been going on for awhile... one would presume they would have had time to prepare something... just because they can’t do the higher end chips... doesn’t mean they couldn’t have something in the works for the lower end chip supply...
 
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