On December 6, 2021, the "White Paper on China's 5G Development and Economic and Social Impact - The Initial Results of Developing the Blue Ocean" (hereinafter referred to as the "White Paper") released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology predicts that 5G will directly drive the total economic output of 1.3 trillion yuan in 2021, directly drive the economic added value of about 300 billion yuan, indirectly drive the total output of about 3.38 trillion yuan, and indirectly drive the economic added value of about 1.23 trillion yuan, respectively, an increase of 33%, 39% and 31% over 2020. and 31%.
China has achieved a global leading edge in the field of 5G. As the key base of digital development, 5G technology integrates digital technologies such as edge computing, cloud computing, Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, and big data to provide a new path for the digital transformation of the economy and society, and the commercial development of 5G will profoundly affect the process of China's digital transformation.
"As the core equipment of the 5G network, the 5G base station contains a large number of semiconductor basic components, which are indispensable to the quartz crystal oscillator known as the heart of the electronic device. Tsinghua Unigroup's Tangshan Guoxin Crystal Source masters ultra-high fundamental frequency, ultra-high stability, ultra-small size crystal processing technology, and is the main supplier of frequency components for domestic head communication equipment manufacturers. Xu Jianmin, general manager of Tangshan Guoxin Jingyuan, told the Economic Observer that the demand for high-end areas of crystal oscillator products in China's market is mainly based on imports. Under the blessing of common needs such as 5G, new infrastructure, and artificial intelligence, the demand for crystal oscillator market is becoming increasingly high-end, which will vigorously promote the development of China's crystal oscillator industry to high-end application fields and gradually realize localization applications.
Since its inception in 1990, Tangshan Guoxin Jingyuan is committed to the research and development of key technologies for quartz crystal components, and is one of the few enterprises in China that have mastered a full range of quartz piezoelectric crystal manufacturing technology, with wafer processing, finished product assembly to product testing processing capacity. In the list of the second batch of state-level specialized and special new "little giant" enterprises announced by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology this year, Tangshan Guoxin Jingyuan was successfully selected with more than 30 years of technical accumulation and innovation ability in the field of piezoelectric crystal frequency components.
Localization innovation and development
Piezoelectric crystal oscillator as the basic component of frequency selection and frequency stabilization, providing time reference and frequency synchronization in digital circuits, is an indispensable and important component of electronic equipment, is likened to the "salt" of the electronics industry; in recent years, piezoelectric crystal oscillator is widely used in 5G network communications, automotive electronics, industrial control, artificial intelligence, medical equipment, Internet of Things and other fields, providing accurate reference clock signals and receiving signals, also known as "the salt of the information industry".
For a long time, the global quartz crystal component manufacturers are mainly concentrated in Japan, the United States, Taiwan and Chinese mainland. In terms of industry market characteristics, Japan, the United States, and Taiwan are dominated by the high-end market, accounting for 65% of the global quartz crystal market, and domestic products are mainly supporting low-end applications. Domestic piezoelectric crystal oscillator enterprises started late, manufacturers have insufficient investment in product research and development, and the initial domestic crystal oscillator is mainly low-end products. After more than 30 years of development, domestic technology has gradually matured, the gap with similar foreign products has been significantly narrowed, most of the low-end crystal oscillator products have been localized, but high-end crystal oscillator is still in its infancy, its core manufacturing technology is still in the hands of foreign companies.
Electronic components are the cornerstone of supporting the development of the information technology industry, and also the key to ensuring the safety and stability of the industrial chain supply chain. At present, China's electronic components industry has problems such as the overall large but not strong, the lack of leading enterprises, and insufficient innovation capabilities, which restrict the development of the information technology industry. The national "14th Five-Year Plan" proposes to develop strategic emerging industries, accelerate the development of core basic components, and promote the development of advanced basic components; the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology's "Action Plan for the Development of basic electronic components industry (2021-2023)" pointed out that accelerating the development of basic electronics industries such as electronic components and supporting materials and equipment and instruments is of great significance to promoting the upgrading of the information technology industry foundation, the modernization of the industrial chain, and even the realization of high-quality development of the national economy.
In the development of the domestic crystal components industry, Tangshan Guoxin Jingyuan was the first batch of manufacturers to enter this field in the 90s, and the company's development of more than 30 years can be roughly divided into three steps. The first decade (1990-1999) was the stage of entrepreneurship and exploration. In the case of not understanding technology, lacking capital, and thirdly not engaging in export-oriented economic knowledge, entrepreneurs borrowed ships to go to sea, took the first step in entrepreneurship, founded the first Sino-foreign joint venture in Yutian County, and realized export earnings.
The second decade (2000-2009) was a phase of development and growth. On June 6, 2005, the company was listed on the SME edition of the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, and continued to increase fixed assets and R&D investment by giving full play to the advantages of the financing platform, and constantly catching up with the advanced level of the international industry.
The third decade (2010-2019) is the stage of joint strength and leapfrogging. Since 2010, the company has implemented the development strategy of "relying on da lianqiang", and the company is currently a core industry company of frequency components under Tsinghua Unigroup. So far, Tangshan Guoxin Crystal Source has more than 6,000 varieties of crystal oscillators and resonators in 26 categories. More than 65% of Tangshan Guoxin's products are exported to the United States, Germany, South Korea, Hong Kong and Taiwan and other countries and regions, and is a direct supporting supplier for many internationally renowned enterprises, a domestic head communication equipment manufacturer and a main supplier of frequency components for localization development and "new infrastructure", and a "salt" for the information industry. This also shows that the quality of its crystal oscillator has been affirmed by customers in Europe and the United States and other markets. "In our industry, most of the original equipment, raw materials, and technologies come from abroad, and we know that only by calming down to increase the development of original technology and mastering the core manufacturing technology in our own hands can we stand in an invincible position in the piezoelectric crystal oscillator industry, and only in this way can we grasp the very good market opportunity of localization." Xu Jianmin said that at present, relevant domestic enterprises are actively conducting research and development, and some technologies have made breakthroughs, such as Tangshan Guoxin Jingyuan, which has broken through the monopoly of related technologies in miniaturization, high frequency, high precision and other technologies, and ranked among the international advanced ranks. "The company is in a leading position in terms of technology breadth and international layout, and its future business and market scalability are more advantageous." According to the wisdom bud data of the SaaS service provider of Science and Technology Intelligence, Tangshan Guoxin's patented technology mainly focuses on quartz crystals, quartz wafers, crystal oscillators, crystal resonators and other technical fields, the technical quality level is excellent, the company has strong technical strength in the industry, and faces few technical competition challenges.
New technologies and new opportunities
Quartz crystal oscillator provides high-end reference clock signal and receive transmission signal for 5G, ensuring the high-speed and stable operation of 5G network, and is the core electronic component of 5G technology. In June 2019, China issued a 5G license, becoming the first country in the world to carry out 5G commercial use. In 2020, the number of new 5G connections in China exceeded 200 million, accounting for 87% of the global 5G connections; the total number of dual-mode 5G base stations exceeded 700,000; as of the end of September 2021, China has opened more than 1.15 million 5G base stations, accounting for more than 70% of the global 5G base stations.
From smartphones, wearable electronics, laptops to smart cars, quartz crystal oscillators are an indispensable component in electronic circuits and are widely used. Each smartphone needs 2-5, each wearable device needs 1-5, each laptop needs 3-4, and each mobile phone base station needs 1-1 or more. Through the research of related industries, the Piezoelectric Crystal Branch of the China Electronic Components Industry Association predicts that by 2025, the piezoelectric crystal oscillator industry will have a compound annual growth rate of about 20%.
"For example, an ordinary fuel car will probably use 40-60 piezoelectric crystal oscillators, and the current new energy vehicles will use about 50-100, if it is a future intelligent driving car, to the L5 level, it will have to use thousands." Xu Jianmin said that previously, car supporting products accounted for only 5% of the company's revenue, and now due to the rise of new energy vehicles, it will rise to 15%.
At present, Tangshan Guoxin Jingyuan has entered the 4th ten-year development period, and entered the stage of innovation and beyond development, the company has undertaken and implemented a number of provincial strategic emerging industry development projects, provincial major scientific and technological achievements transformation projects, is currently a direct supporting supplier of many internationally renowned enterprises, domestic head communication equipment manufacturers frequency components localization innovation and "new infrastructure" main suppliers, the company's miniaturization products to achieve international advanced, high-frequency products to fill the domestic gap, high-precision products to achieve industry leadership.
"We will firmly grasp the opportunity of digital economic development, layout TWS, IoT, wearable devices, artificial intelligence application scenarios supporting the ultra-miniature crystal oscillator, network equipment, base station communication with ultra-high frequency crystal oscillator, automotive electronics (intelligent driving), network communication, radar measurement and control and navigation equipment with ultra-stable crystal oscillator, to meet the needs of domestic and foreign markets." Xu Jianmin said that Tangshan Guoxin Crystal Source will follow the endogenous + epitaxial development strategy, break through the Q-MEMS ultra-high frequency lithography technology, ultra-small SMD quartz crystal resonator, SMD type KHz quartz crystal resonator and other key core technologies, solve the "card neck" problem, fill in the gaps, meet the localization needs of key frequency components, plan and build clock crystal oscillators, TSX thermal crystals and other industrialization projects to meet the needs of new application scenarios. It is expected that the compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of output value will reach more than 30% in the next five years.
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