Chinese semiconductor industry

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BlackWindMnt

Captain
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The article does have some contradictions..

Everything needs to be redone
TSMC's N7 is as far from those halcyon days as you can get. Each different design needs a lot of work to get from circuit to chip. You can't take an old design and slap it in, not at the complete design level, not at the functional block level, not at the transistor level. Everything needs to be reinvented, the tools, the techniques, the lot.
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Here he act like everything can just be copied pasted over to the new 7nm. From what I understood the shortages were mostly in older chip using older nodes which China did scale up.
Furthermore, that chip has been in production for a year. If you have a commercial 7nm line in full swing for a year during a huge global chip shortage, you go to market as soon as humanly possible. Perhaps SMIC is fully committed to its internal market of OEMs, government and military demands, but the Chinese state loves to flaunt any ability to confound expectations and side-step embargos. Silence can be very suggestive.
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China last year launched two exascale super computers in secret. Now China is saying they want to have 10 exascale computers by 2025.

Seems like there will be more then enough trial run attempts for SMIC 7n before allocating more to private market.

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gadgetcool5

Senior Member
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european_guy said:
SMIC will get the full and unlimited support of the whole Chinese semiconductor industry togheter with state research institutes and big funds: from Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) to AMEC and NAURA, from top universities to the last supplier, from Chinese IC manufactures customers to State Big Fund. This is a much more powerful display of forces than what TSMC can ever dream.

So in both cases, in the long term, is an uneven battle for TSMC. And TSMC cannot win it.
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That's one possibility. The other possibility is that SMIC will come under discipline investigation for being a monopoly, for violating cybersecurity, for violations of discipline, for corruption, for disorderly expansion of capital, for being insufficiently communist, etc. and will be fined massively, senior officers forced out, funders will take a bath and lose everything, it will have shipments suspended, and it will not be able to get licenses to sell anything. Its stock will tank, his revenues will shrink, it will be hit with massive layoffs, reductions in already small R&D budget, and it will fall further behind.

Meanwhile Intel gets the full support of the US government and even though it is incompetent and would have gone bankrupt by market rules, it is forced to succeed and eventually it does.
 
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weig2000

Captain
hvpc said:
Technically, the authors are correct. But they are not looking at the whole picture as they are talking about the past.

UMC produced 14nm bitcoin mining chips as far back as 2017. Yet no one give them credit for having true 14nm capability. So, no one is treating SMIC any differently on their accomplishment last year with the MinerVA chip.

SMIC has since last year been improving on their capability and is now in risk production of real 7nm chips now.

So, the article is correct in stating SMIC could not build a real 7nm chip last year. But the article is incorrect in not realizing SMIC is now capable of a 7nm chip as of today. The yield may not be the best, but it's good enough to declare they could make 7nm chips.
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I understand your cautiousness and desire to strictly stick to the fact and not going overboard, etc., particularly given that this thread sometimes demonstrates a tendency to do so .... But,

The guy is making ignorant statements and is incorrect in the context of his statements. Clearly, the implication is that "no worries, China's 7nm chip is one-off and no real indication of China being capable of producing true 7nm chips. It's a starter chip." This is not too different from calling Liaoning "
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" today.

It's copium.
 
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ansy1968

Brigadier
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gadgetcool5 said:
That's one possibility. The other possibility is that SMIC will come under discipline investigation for being a monopoly, for violating cybersecurity, for violations of discipline, for corruption, for disorderly expansion of capital, for being insufficiently communist, etc. and will be fined massively, senior officers forced out, funders will take a bath and lose everything, it will have shipments suspended, and it will not be able to get licenses to sell anything. Its stock will tank, his revenues will shrink, it will be hit with massive layoffs, reductions in already small R&D budget, and it will fall further behind.

Meanwhile Intel gets the full support of the US government and even though it is incompetent and would have gone bankrupt by market rules, it is forced to succeed and eventually it does.
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@gadgetcool5 bro please don't be insulted BUT at what planet are you on.
 
manqiangrexue

manqiangrexue

Brigadier
gadgetcool5 said:
That's one possibility. The other possibility is that SMIC will come under discipline investigation for being a monopoly, for violating cybersecurity, for violations of discipline, for corruption, for disorderly expansion of capital, for being insufficiently communist, etc. and will be fined massively, senior officers forced out, funders will take a bath and lose everything, it will have shipments suspended, and it will not be able to get licenses to sell anything. Its stock will tank, his revenues will shrink, it will be hit with massive layoffs, reductions in already small R&D budget, and it will fall further behind.
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If that happens, then it's because SMIC had truly committed some egregious oppertunistic crimes and China has better back-ups than SMIC in line. But, it's actually more your dream than a real possibility as always.
gadgetcool5 said:
Meanwhile Intel gets the full support of the US government and even though it is incompetent and would have gone bankrupt by market rules, it is forced to succeed and eventually it does.
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You can't force someone to succeed and that's why the US, despite its ability to print the global reserve currency, is being overrun by Chinese innovation.
 
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