Chang'e 5 Tianwen No. 1, now China has made epoch-making progress in the field of aerospace, but we have accelerated our pace in space exploration, and chip manufacturing is difficult. Some time ago, a paper ban in the United States made chip manufacturing into a bottleneck, so China's rockets can fly into the sky, why can a small chip be difficult to defeat billions of Chinese people? How are chips made? Why is there a distinction between good and bad? The so-called chip is to place a circuit that can calculate or store functions on a very small silicon wafer. A complete chip birth requires three steps, design, manufacturing, and packaging, any of which will affect the final effect of the chip.
When the United States sanctions, Huawei and other high-tech enterprises choke the throat of the development of China's chip industry, we will think of Zhang Rujing, the father of Chinese semiconductors, who started a business five times in the 42 years of the semiconductor industry, and every time he started again from the beginning, it is a wonderful story, and every story confirms his fist patriotism.
Zhang Rujing, the godfather of Chinese semiconductors, was the weather vane in the world chip industry in the 90s, and wherever he built a factory, it was the incubator of the next chip market. In the field of chip-obsessed joy that was born in his hands, China, which was home to 1.3 billion people at the time, was as quiet as transparent people. Although the driver of this carnival was once a Chinese. Zhang Rujing, who insisted on returning to China in 1997, tried to drag the technologically backward China into the cutting-edge chip technology track in a sentence mr Zhang was afraid that it was not crazy, but he was suppressed and attacked by Taiwan Province and TSMC in the past 20 years. Originally born from the same root, why is it too urgent to fry each other? Has the once-idealistic 73-year-old conceded defeat? What role has TSMC, which has responded positively to the new regulations imposed by the United States on Huawei, played in the 20 years since Zhang Rujing returned to China?
The father of the chip, Zhang Rujing's road to making cores, has been blocked by TSMC many times, and now the product quality rate is as high as 90%, the mainland chip ushered in a new help, he single-handedly dragged backward China into the most cutting-edge technology chip, he gave up all his wealth, from the United States to Taiwan to the mainland, again and again was accused of expulsion, knocked out teeth or blood swallowed. He is Zhang Rujing, a person who is deeply dragging China Semiconductor forward. Zhang Rujing was born in Nanjing in 1948 and moved to Taiwan with his parents four years later. He graduated from National Taiwan University in 1970 and received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Southern Methodist University. In 1977, he joined the American semiconductor giant Texas Instruments and became a master of factory construction. Wherever he built a factory, it became a hot soil of zinc flakes, but the seeds of returning to China to build a factory had long been planted in his heart. In 1997, Zhang Rujing insisted on resigning and returning to China, and established ten major companies in Taiwan, in just three years, it will be the third largest chip factory in Taiwan after TSMC and UMC, and belongs to the third largest semiconductor company in Taiwan. In 2000, Zhang Zhongmou suddenly intervened, and the secret contact was to beat other shareholders to buy Skadden for a high price of $5 billion, and Zhang Rujing once again became Zhang Zhongmou's subordinate without his knowledge. Faced with such humiliation, Zhang Rujing resolutely left his post in a huff. In order to stay away from conspirators like Zhang Zhongmou, Zhang Rujing also said that the company is no longer needed, the stock is not wanted, and the money is not wanted. All the way north, Zhang Rujing naturally did not, willing to be acquired by Shida. A few months later, Zhang Rujing left Taiwan Province with a family, including her 90-year-old mother. Taiwan chip giant Zhang has now once again announced that he has given up his Taiwan household registration and moved all to Shanghai, thanks to Zhang Ru. Because of their kindness and technical addiction, many employees also left TSMC and followed Zhang Rujing to Shanghai to found SMIC. We urgently need high-end talents like Zhang Rujing, I heard that SMIC wanted to settle in Shanghai, and welcomed with open arms, and threw an olive branch to Zhang Rujing, giving policy preferences, the company was tax-free for the first five years, halved in the last five years, and the land was almost rent-free.
Zhang Yongjing set his sights on Shanghai and prepared to build a fab. But fabs cost a lot of money, and a most common eight-inch production line costs about $1 billion. In this case, Zhang Rujing plays the role of a pioneer. In terms of funds, Zhang Rujing used its accumulated resources and reputation to raise $1 billion in just one year. In terms of talents, in addition to more than 100 overseas colleagues who have been following the Daniel Zhang army, more than 300 Taiwan compatriots have also settled in Shanghai with him. To show his resolve, Zhang Rujing moved his wife and children, even the 90-year-old mother, to Shanghai. Zhang Rujing's sense of mission and family and country also motivate colleagues to face challenges and work hard. After the problem of funds and talents is solved, technology and equipment are the biggest problems faced by the strong. After the end of the Cold War, the Western countries led by the United States signed the Wassenaar Agreement, which restricted the export of various commodities or technologies such as advanced materials, devices, and military products, and China was one of the banned countries. Even if China pays a high price for technology, the United States will intervene to block a deal that could otherwise be possible. In order to be able to buy advanced equipment and technology, Zhang Rujing searched for five major churches to endorse his personality, and repeatedly promised that SMIC's products were only used for commercial financing, not for financial and other fields, which obtained an export license from the United States.
I just didn't expect that the person who most directly showed His sword to Zhang Rujing was not the United States, but his hometown of Taiwan Province. In 2002, a notice came from the strait ordering Zhang Rujing to withdraw his investment from the mainland within six months, otherwise he would pay NT$15 million on a regular basis. Zhang Rujing did not respond, followed by an official announcement against Zhang Rujing, who was not allowed to set foot for ten years. A Taiwanese enterprise that has withdrawn its Taiwanese citizenship and financed its company will also be affected if it does not divest. Without identity and funds, Zhang Rujing should also go to the end. In the past few years, relying on the first-class supply speed to suppress the price, many international orders have been won one after another, and a siege and suppression operation led by TSMC has quietly begun. First a senior R&D and management personnel of the company broke the contract and left, and then SMIC was accused of technical plagiarism, and the confession of internal employees was presented, which was written by employees who jumped from TSMC to the center, without the slightest retreat, the other party gave the road, the city center was either acquired by TSMC, or the lawsuit was discredited, or Zhang Rujing never touched the chip and electronics industry, Zhang Rujing was forced into a dead corner. Prior to this, SMIC had gone public and occupied a large market, but now Zhang Rujing set the center of gravity, and all the bad reputations from the announcement of being acquired to leaving the company he founded, TSMC only gave him seven days to pocket the center and make a big fuss. Since then, we have held half of the mainland chip. Zhang Rujing's former deputy became the new leader of the center, and less than a year after the replacement, the center employees who cooperated with Huawei had one hand, equipped with the glory mobile phone of the 14-nanometer chip developed by himself. Today, SMIC has grown to become China's largest and the world's fourth largest chip manufacturer. Zhang Rujing was the first person to pull the mainland chip industry forward, he gave up the glory and status in the United States in the first few decades of his life, and gave up everything in Taiwan Province to come to the mainland. But for the next 20 years, he was always falling, but without this person who seemed to be advertised as a loser, China's semiconductor industry would not have developed to where it is today.
In 2014, at the age of 66, Zhang Rujing started a business again, Shanghai Xinsheng is a company focusing on silicon, the material with the largest chip cost. In 2018, Zhang Rujing, who was a rare old man, gathered the three most important links of chip manufacturing industry design, manufacturing and packaging and testing with Xinen Integrated Circuit Company. To this day, it is still striving for Gucci Chinese mainland weak links in the chip industry chain. From the ZTE crisis in 2018, to the fact that most of Huawei's international business was forced to go offline in 2019, and then to the Huawei Grand Princess incident, Chinese wake up and pinch the chip supply, we can choke the pace of China's electronic development. As a result, more and more talents began to develop day and night with a breath of invincibility, and many companies such as Huawei began to launch the Genius Youth Program. Zhang Rujing once said that the chip war is the battle of talents, and more than 20 years ago, he was also a high-end talent among the returned Chinese. When an industry rises, it needs a group of strong people who do not seek fame and fortune and can always adhere to the leadership on the road of development. In addition to overcoming the difficulties of technology and equipment, and even overseas restrictions, they must also guard against the means of suppression of peer enterprises. Zhang Rujing was a man of great strength, but his opponent was too strong, and there were too few partners who really moved towards a goal at that time. The forerunners may not be able to get the flowers and applause of the times, but they are not ashamed on the way forward, and they also open up a broad road for the successors.
His faith, Chinese can not lose, to let future generations live better. Leaving SMIC's chapter, he is still running on the frontline battlefield of Chinese chips, and has worked in Shanghai, Qingdao, and Qingdao. Some people have commented that he does not have a decent suit, but he has the grand dream of Chinese semiconductors. This man is not here to make money, which is the most admirable. A Chinese chip factory was built on the mainland, and although he left, SMIC survived its darkest hours and survived the cracks. So some people ask me, will China's chip road be far away? I laughed and said that at 1.4 billion, the people of the whole country worked together, and chip manufacturing was no problem.