Chinese semiconductor thread II

[HighGround]

Another technology that going against the industry ASML bias is nanoimprint lithography, I do think the technology has potential to be cost effective and could give better results that even EUV. But good luck telling the "decade experience" China semiconductor guard break their ASML bias to setup semiconductor labs with Tenren Nano and others to push the technology forward for its use in advance logic.

This is the same in every industry, in every country. Incumbents always want to do things their way and believe their way is the best way or the only way.

I think we'll be starting to hear more and more EUV news in the next two years. Maybe even something more concrete. Like you all said, this effort will take years. Assuming a prototype is constructed in 2030, more substantive news/rumours should be reported sometime in the next two years.

 

[sunnymaxi]

will post a detailed report..

 

[antwerpery]

This is the same in every industry, in every country. Incumbents always want to do things their way and believe their way is the best way or the only way.

I think we'll be starting to hear more and more EUV news in the next two years. Maybe even something more concrete. Like you all said, this effort will take years. Assuming a prototype is constructed in 2030, more substantive news/rumours should be reported sometime in the next two years.

Prototype doesn't matter that much. What matters is mass production. Having a fully functional Chinese EUV today doesn't matter if mass production is years away. And even mass production doesn't matter if you can just make 2-3 machines a year, not when ASML is making hundreds a year. There's still a lot of uncertainties and challenges to China's EUV problem. Having a prototype is merely just a single step on a long staircase.

 

[tokenanalyst]

This is the same in every industry, in every country. Incumbents always want to do things their way and believe their way is the best way or the only way.

I think we'll be starting to hear more and more EUV news in the next two years. Maybe even something more concrete. Like you all said, this effort will take years. Assuming a prototype is constructed in 2030, more substantive news/rumours should be reported sometime in the next two years.

Without saying a lot, have you notice the big push on mask, mask inspection, photoresists. How is China is testing this? to properly design EUV masks you need reticle handlers and reticle stages to make sure that the mask standard will work and fit properly, but also you need the EUV illumination systems, EUV reduction optics, the imaging system and everything else that will hold all of that to make sure that the pattern will project properly. I first I thought that a lot of China BIG EUV tech development was purely theoretical, that they will start small and simple but I was wrong, there is a big downplay of a lot that China already have and they are going BIG. To be honest I think 2030 could be too far off. I think we nailed in this thread.

 

[antwerpery]

Without saying a lot, have you notice the big push on mask, mask inspection, photoresists. How is China is testing this? to properly design EUV masks you need reticle handlers and reticle stages to make sure that the mask standard will work and fit properly, but also you need the EUV illumination systems, EUV reduction optics, the imaging system and everything else that will hold all of that to make sure that the pattern will project properly. I first I thought that a lot of China BIG EUV tech development was purely theoretical, that they will start small and simple but I was wrong, there is a big downplay of a lot that China already have and they are going BIG. To be honest I think 2030 could be too far off. I think we nailed in this thread.

And how long do you think it will take to go from prototype to mass production?

 

[tokenanalyst]

And the date for eventual mass production?

That will depend on the government push, it seems that they already setting some suppliers, companies without websites and like a I said before, is up to SMIC and other big Chinese fabs to decide if they want to produce cutting edge chips or the want to make chips for refrigerators forever.
The Chinese government seem to have this aptitude of "recommending" the use of semiconductor equipment being develop in the country and a "fair" bidding system that allow some monopolies to outbid small dometic players.

 

[staplez]

lol, I don’t mind the criticism, just throwing out ideas since we saw such a huge market correction this week in the US. Now people far better qualified than me (not really qualified for anything…) seem to think the demand for cutting edge chips might be greatly exaggerated.

To address some of the points brought up.

- We’ve seen actually many companies continue work despite being at risk of sanctions which ended up coming down, the latest example being Li Auto. Prior to this Moore Threads and Biren, those are off the top of my head (All were still working on TSMC process past 2023, they must have known sanctions were coming and continued work anyway).

- Cars are using mostly 28nm and above except for advanced UIs and Drive assist functions. They are only on higher end cars, so the market is not huge yet. The cost of the self driving/assistance systems as a whole is not yet sufficiently low to drive volumes in the millions. Even in the large China market this holds true.

- Handset makers cannot just go to SMIC because they don’t have their own SOC design. Only Huawei/HiSilicon has a high end SOC and they are not known for sharing. China doesn’t have a Qualcomm equivalent. UNISOC is low end for now. Of course, this could be a chicken and egg situation.

- Having the machines is not a genie in a lamp situation. As I pointed out, Intel and Samsung both have EUV equipment, and are in trouble. Samsung is reported to have extremely low yields at 3nm. They have not had any big clients on the level of nVidia/Qualcomm since their 8nm process.

- @tokenanalyst is capturing the essence of my thinking. The starting point might be stronger than we know. Going back to Samsung, they are reported to have only 20% yield on the 3nm GAA process, yet they were trying to sell this as commercially viable. Also reportedly Intel has below 50% for 18A (similar to 3nm). Chinese companies developing EUV equipment must be aware of the issues those companies are having so it makes sense (especially in light of current market conditions) to take time to go beyond what our current expectations might be.

I think I understand what you're saying. What you're not understanding is a fundamental issue with technology. Technology is NOT monolithic. If we're going to separate technology the way US has done with sanctions, you're going to see a country like China advance further in some areas and not in others. What that should say to you isn't we don't need the technology, but instead how far can China go once they reach that level. Their stuff will pair with the newer tech just as well as the older tech. It's not made in a bubble. Whenever China gets to EUV, we're going to see an explosion unlike anything we've seen before. If they can make 7nm perform as well as 4nm, what can they do with 2nm?

 

[tokenanalyst]

The national key R&D project "8-inch silicon-based piezoelectric film and piezoelectric MEMS sensor manufacturing process platform" led by Saiwei Electronics' holding subsidiary was launched​

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In May 2024, the launch and implementation plan demonstration meeting of the "8-inch silicon-based piezoelectric film and piezoelectric MEMS sensor manufacturing process platform" project, a key project of the "Intelligent Sensor" National Key R&D Program, was successfully held in Beijing Economic and Technological Development Zone. The project was led by Saileis Beijing, a subsidiary of Saiwei Electronics, and jointly implemented by many units. The meeting confirmed the rationality of the implementation plans of each project, enabled the member units of the project team to clarify their respective division of labor and tasks, and determined the key nodes and phased goals of the implementation, laying a good foundation for the smooth implementation of the project in the future.

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[tphuang]

Can we please keep DeepSeek related stuff to AI thread?

 

[antwerpery]

So good new and bad news.

Bad news
America is likely going to clamp down even harder on chip restriction and export controls. Maybe even a total ban on nvidia sales? It's more than possible. But it's going to happen eventually. Restrictions on other countries will probably be heightened, since the whole "they're smuggling chips to China" narrative is quite strong right now. The tier1/2/3 export controls introduced by Biden will be here to stay.

Good news
Hauwei has even more a captive market now. And once they can mass produce a competitive GPU to Nvida's SOTA, they can likely take over the tier 2 countries affected by the American export controls easily too.