Chinese semiconductor thread II

[tokenanalyst]

That's how bad the lithography situation is in China right now and I don't think it's realistic for mass production of EUV within this decade, maybe a prototype or two at most

FOR GOD SAKE MAN, they tested a EUV prototype 7 years <SEVEN> ago, they are not starting today, they have years of experience with EUV related technologies, yes is not as flashy as ASML and is challenging but is not to be underestimated.

Is like that same crap that I hear over and over again from these know nothing humanities school think tankers that are now dictating semiconductor policy in D.C.​

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Chinese semiconductor industry

This Research Paper looks to have been published in 2022. It looks like they are making a huge national push in the development of LPP EUVL. The good news is that the Wuhan Uni and Huazhong Uni Team seems to have already developed a MOPA C02 Laser of at least 27kw Laser Power. This is similar...

www.sinodefenceforum.com

 

[siegecrossbow]

Chinese secrecy on semiconductor progress has resulted in the same underestimation we see of Chinese military tech…

 

[tokenanalyst]

Chinese secrecy on semiconductor progress has resulted in the same underestimation we see of Chinese military tech…

Do you remember the J-20? Every single aviation "expert" that have never worked in airplane before talking about that China would fligth the first stealth fighter in 2030, just be silenced when the J-20 appeared in 2011. When you go the research literature China has been working on stealth technology since 90s. Then when with the usuals cope attacks of accusing China of "stealing" the F-22.

 

[tacoburger]

DUV is fairly mature technology, SMEE failed to develop any DUV products despite working on it for more then a decade, even after 2018 exposed China's crippling lithography weakness. 2024 might finally be the year that their SSA800 is mass produced, maybe.

You can say market forces all you want, but this "market forces" haven't stopped other semiconductor equipment companies like AMEC/NAURA etc from gaining decent market share and developing fairly competive products even before the sanctions hit. It's just SMEE and they haven't seem to have sped up even after the sanctions took market forces out of the picture. It's almost like there's certain sectors or techolognies that some countries are really weak in.

There's really no argument to say that EUV, a much much harder techologny, is gonna see much faster development time, just because a bunch of different companies are working on it.

FOR GOD SAKE MAN, they tested a EUV prototype 7 years <SEVEN> ago, they are not starting today, they have years of experience with EUV related technologies, yes is not as flashy as ASML and is challenging but is not to be underestimated.

ASML had a EUV prototype in 2006. Having a prototype and mass production is very different things.

FOR GOD SAKE MAN, China literally had a entire SOE dedicated solely to making lithography machines 20 <TWENTY> years ago without any real result until this year.

 

[Blitzo]

DUV is fairly mature technology, SMEE failed to develop any DUV products despite working on it for more then a decade, even after 2018 exposed China's crippling lithography weakness. 2024 might finally be the year that their SSA800 is mass produced, maybe.

You can say market forces all you want, but this "market forces" haven't stopped other semiconductor equipment companies like AMEC/NAURA etc from gaining decent market share and developing fairly competive products even before the sanctions hit. It's just SMEE and they haven't seem to have sped up even after the sanctions took market forces out of the picture. It's almost like there's certain sectors or techolognies that some countries are really weak in.

There's really no argument to say that EUV, a much much harder techologny, is gonna see much faster development time, just because a bunch of different companies are working on it.

In that case, then there's just an inherent impasse.

To me, the lack of serious pursuit of a domestic DUV lithography capability until the last few years is entirely reasonable, if not expected, exactly based on the balance of market forces, incentives, and customer expectations, and I do not view the past decades of DUV development as being reflective of technological or technical limitations that are generalizable or able to be extrapolated to other ongoing current or near future lithography developments (DUV or EUV).

If you've said your piece now, then you'll have to accept that the vast majority of others that have followed this thread hold a conclusion different to yours, and the only thing to do is to wait a few years and see where the pieces land.
You can continue to make your case, but it will eventually be a matter of other people talking among themselves and acknowledging your post with a thumbs up before moving on with the conversation.

 

[tokenanalyst]

You can say market forces all you want, but this "market forces" haven't stopped other semiconductor equipment companies like AMEC/NAURA etc from gaining decent market share and developing fairly competive products even before the sanctions hit

Absolutely WRONG, Naura and Amec had horrible semiconductor market share before the sanctions hit. Naura survived selling tools for the packaging and the PV industry and AMEC survived by taking a big market share of the MOCVD market in the Chinese FPD industry, so do your research.

ASML had a EUV prototype in 2006. Having a prototype and mass production is very different things.

YES now you get it, that one I show IS the prototype the one they are developing now IS the blueprint for mass production.

 

[tokenanalyst]

FOR GOD SAKE MAN, China literally had a entire SOE dedicated solely to making lithography machines 20 <TWENTY> years ago without any real result until this year

The Chinese government has allowed ASML to take SMEE market share but they did their job, they develop and sold their I-line, KrF and ArF dry machines since 2011, they sold 100 of those machine <specially their I-line machines> by 2018, peanuts compared to ASML but something is something.


and 2017 started the development of their immersion lithography machines that was planned to be a 65nm lithography but looks like that has been upgraded to reach ASML 2000i scanner. Just because SMEE is not a public company doesn't mean that you can't find information of them.

 

[tacoburger]

To me, the lack of serious pursuit of a domestic DUV lithography capability until the last few years is entirely reasonable, if not expected, exactly based on the balance of market forces, incentives, and customer expectations, and I do not view the past decades of DUV development as being reflective of technological or technical limitations that are generalizable or able to be extrapolated to other ongoing current or near future lithography developments (DUV or EUV).

If there wasn't a serious pursuit, SMEE wouldn't have been founded in 2002 and kept alive all this years. And I do not buy the market forces theory for SMEE's exceptionally slow development. Basically every high tech chinese product in the last 30 years has had to fight tooth and nail against western products and various other market forces, almost every area from passenger jets to nuclear reactors has seen decent progress other then in lithography machines, and those fields weren't even sanctioned 6 years ago. There's a reason why lithography is a extremely hard techologny and there's a reason why everyone other then ASML has basically dropped out of the field.

And if we can't draw on past experiences, what else is there left to draw on? The handful of scraps of info that we get that has people here speculating that EUV is right around the corner around 2025/2026? There's basically no evidence for that either. There has been a lot of progress but no indication on how it translate into the readiness for mass production.

I will add that EUV being made up of so many critical parts means that even a single critical competent being delayed means the entire machine is delayed. It's not like a J-20 situation where it can fly without it's intended engine for a couple years while the WS-15 was being worked on. Having 90% of the EUV ready today doesn't mean much if critical parts like light source or optics or wafer stage isn't ready for another decade.

That was the problem that SMEE faced wasn't it? Like ASML, they mainly worked on intergrating various competents from various suppliers into a complete machine, they didn't produce everything inhouse. And their suppliers kept having issues and delays. I mean I would love it if EUV came out in 2025 but there's plenty of reasons that it's development path will be plagued with delays.

But fine I will drop the topic.

Absolutely WRONG, Naura and Amec had horrible semiconductor market share before the sanctions hit. Naura survived selling tools for the packaging and the PV industry and AMEC survived by taking a big market share of the MOCVD in the Chinese FPD industry, so do you research.

Still better than what SMEE had. At least they had a somewhat competive products that could stand on their own. And they sure scaled up fast when the sanctions came knocking.

 

[sunnymaxi]

You can say market forces all you want, but this "market forces" haven't stopped other semiconductor equipment companies like AMEC/NAURA etc from gaining decent market share and developing fairly competive products even before the sanctions hit

man you are so shameless.. without knowing anything you are posting nonsense.

NAURA/AMEC and other local firms were non-existent in semiconductor supply chain in Mainland before sanctions..
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now what happened in 2023-2024

AMEC expecting CCP market share went from 24% last Oct to 60% in near future and ICP market share from 0 to 75% (Replaced LAM in mainland).

First half 2023 - Chinese semiconductor equipment companies revenue

Naura - 7.14B RMB up 68%
AMEC - 2.53B RMB up 28%
ACM Research - 1.61B RMB up 47%
Hwatsing - 1.23B RMB up 72%
Piotech - 1B RMB up 92%

at the end of 2023, NAURA entered in top 10 biggest semiconductor equipment companies in the world. this was an elite club only reserved for west and Japan. but time has changed.

this is first time a Chinese firm breach top 10.. went from nobody to enter in top 10 in just few years. next company likely to enter in top will be AMEC. more Chinese companies are coming.

this all happened because of sanctions..

 

[tokenanalyst]

If there wasn't a serious pursuit, SMEE wouldn't have been founded in 2002 and kept alive all this years. And I do not buy the market forces theory for SMEE's exceptionally slow development. Basically every high tech chinese product in the last 30 years has had to fight tooth and nail against western products and various other market forces, almost every area from passenger jets to nuclear reactors has seen decent progress other then in lithography machines, and those fields weren't even sanctioned 6 years ago. There's a reason why lithography is a extremely hard techologny and there's a reason why everyone other then ASML has basically dropped out of the field.

Is hard technology but is not the reasons you think, Nikon is not worse than ASML but the clients prefer ASML and they develop their manufacturing process for ASML machines. because the clients are so few that is not worth the huge investment...UNLESS A BIG COUNTRY SANCTION YOUR COMPANIES AND YOU HAVE NOT OTHER OPTION THAN DOING THE INVESTMENT.

The same thing is happening with SMEE, the manufacturing process of some companies is now being develop to take into account SMEE, KingSemi and DJEL machines.

Still better than what SMEE had. At least they had a somewhat competive products that could stand on their own. And they sure scaled up fast when the sanctions came knocking.

SMEE have 80% <EIGHTY PERCENT> of the Chinese packaging market and at least 40% of the FPD market and I read they have 20% of the semiconductor back end of line semiconductor market. I dare to say that they where in better position that most equipment makers in China before the sanctions.