Recently, according to media reports, the United States, Japan and the Netherlands three semiconductor powers have secretly reached relevant agreements, the main content of which is to prohibit the export to China of important equipment and raw materials needed to manufacture advanced process semiconductors. In a vain attempt to kill the future of China's semiconductors, so as to maintain the hegemony of US science and technology and win the Sino-US scientific and technological competition.
Semiconductor industry
The importance and difficulty of semiconductor equipment and materials
When it comes to semiconductors, we have to say chips, chips have penetrated into our life, science and technology, military, economy, finance and other fields, our daily use of mobile phones, computers, travel on large planes, high-speed rail, national defense field fighters, tanks, etc. are closely related to chips. It can be said that without chips, there will be no future for China, and it will not be possible to realize the yearning of our people for a better life, let alone achieve the goal of strengthening the country and the military.
So why is the chip so difficult to produce, because the equipment and raw materials that produce it can not be manufactured, just take the mobile phone chip as an example, the production of it requires lithography machine, plasma etching machine, ion implanter, reactive ion etching system, single crystal furnace, wafer dicing machine, wafer thinning machine and gas phase epitaxial furnace equipment and other 9 major equipment. On a single lithography machine equipment, there are more than 100,000 parts, a total of 5,000 suppliers around the world, and more than 100,000 parts, 90% of China need to import, German mechanical technology and Zeiss lenses, American light source equipment and lasers, Sweden's bearings and CNC machines These top devices are provided by developed countries in Europe and the United States, and there are very few core components produced in the mainland. The only EVU lithography machine in the world that can produce advanced processes is ASML in the Netherlands.
Dutch ASML lithography machine
People say that the lithography machine is the crystallization of the world's scientific and technological wisdom, so it is difficult for China to manufacture the lithography machine independently. Only by overcoming the problem of chip production can we truly enter the free kingdom of scientific and technological development.
The extent and current situation of the development of China's semiconductor industry
In the past, China wanted to take the road of market for technology, that is, the familiar trade and technology route, but the facts once again proved that the trade and technology route was wrong, and no matter how large the market could not exchange for core technology. The mainland is currently producing 90 nm process chips with 600 series lithography machines produced by Shanghai Microelectronics Equipment Co., Ltd., but it is too far away from the world's most advanced 2 nm process, the shortage of talents in the semiconductor field, core equipment manufacturing, material production, technology research and development are restricting the development of semiconductor technology in the mainland, until 2022, Shanghai officially announced that China has achieved mass production of 14 nm advanced process scale, not staying in the laboratory, nor putting into production news, but mass production, It's a real landing! In addition, 90nm lithography machines, 5nm etching machines, 12-inch large silicon wafers, domestic CPUs, 5G chips, etc. have also achieved breakthroughs.
At the same time, it is necessary to recognize the fact that China's semiconductor industry is still subject to people everywhere, and it will be stuck in the neck at any time. There's a lot more to work on.
The thief of the United States, Japan and the Netherlands to curb China's scientific and technological development is not dead
On April 4, the World Trade Organization's Council on Trade in Goods held a meeting, at which China raised serious concerns about the "Agreement between the United States, Japan, and the Netherlands on Restrictions on Chip Exports," which is an act of serious WTO rules. In the final analysis, it is still the "fear of China" mentality of the United States, worried that with the development of China's science and technology, it will challenge its own scientific and technological hegemony, maintain its scientific and technological competitive advantage, and monopolize the profits of high-end industries. It is best that China's industrial structure should never be upgraded, producing low-end, cheap, low-profit products and transporting them to developed countries. It's just daydreaming and wishful thinking.
The United States launched sanctions against Huawei chips
On April 16, 2018, the US Department of Commerce banned the supply of chips and other products to ZTE for the next 7 years on the grounds of threatening US national security, and it was not lifted until it paid $1 billion and reshuffled the board of directors.
In May 2019, in order to suppress the development of Huawei's 5G industry, the United States also sanctioned Huawei for four years on national security grounds, prohibiting any company that uses American equipment chips to produce chips for Huawei, and is not allowed to provide 5G chips to Huawei, directly cutting Huawei's consumer business that was in full swing that year. Even Yu Chengdong said: "Huawei is a world-wide leader in 5G technology and patents, and it can only use 4G chips." One sentence expresses the sadness and helplessness of China's semiconductor industry.
The United States is frantically suppressing China's 5G industry
On October 4, 2020, SMIC, China's largest chip manufacturer, was subject to U.S. export restrictions, which also severely hindered SMIC's production and business activities on the grounds that it was worried that chips produced by SMIC would be used for military purposes. Such cases abound. The means are endless, everything is used, and beauty has long torn off the mask of disguise, that is, it is to compete with China to the limit.
Means of counterattack and countermeasures
Momentary backwardness does not mean permanent backwardness, nor is it an excuse to give up catching up! It is precisely because of the realization of backwardness that there is a breakthrough from zero to 60 points, and on this basis, the future catch-up from 60 points to 120 points can be achieved. Our J-20 fighter, lunar exploration project, Beidou navigation project which project has not experienced many hardships and been reborn in nirvana. We should not expect Sino-US technology competition, the United States still has a bottom line. So there is no way for us? Of course not, on the one hand, we must give full play to the advantages of social ideas to concentrate on big things, state-owned enterprises and famous enterprises join hands to concentrate resources for breakthroughs in the semiconductor field, Huawei has done a good job in this regard, in the 4 years of sanctions, Huawei has not been idle, has completed the replacement development of 13,000 components, 4000+ circuit board replacement development, Huawei's from cameras, memory chips, screens, protective glass and other fields to lead domestic enterprises to make breakthroughs. Today's Huawei mobile phones, except for Qualcomm's 4G version of SOC, are basically localized and no longer subject to people.
Huawei was not beaten
On the other hand, our counterattack has also begun, on March 31, the Cyberspace Administration of China launched a cybersecurity review of Micron's sales of products in China, Micron's main business is memory chips, its products are widely used in smart phones, personal computers and mobile hard drives and other products, as soon as the news came out, Micron's stock price fell 4%, which is the first step for China to counter the unwarranted sanctions imposed by the United States in the semiconductor field.
If these three countries do not abide by the WTO agreement and prohibit the sale of chips, equipment and materials to China, then China can also impose counter-sanctions on the above three countries and prohibit the supply of urgently needed rare earth products to the above three countries. China is making targeted changes to the current technology export system, the focus of which is to restrict related technologies that can process and refine rare earth elements. China has an important influence and control over the global rare earth industry, with reserves of 44 million tons, rare earth ore output of 132,000 tons, smelting and rare earth permanent magnet material production accounting for 37%, 63%, 94% and 90% of the global share, it can be said that China has absolute say in the world rare earth industry.
Rare earth mining
It is not difficult to mine rare earths, the most difficult thing is to refine, process and utilize. China is a world leader in rare earth extraction, separation and alloy production technology. While the United States and its allies carry out a bottomless technology blockade against China, China's inclusion of rare earth refining, processing and utilization technology in the list of prohibited exports is undoubtedly a strong countermeasure to the overseas blockade. History has proved many times that the more foreign countries blockade and restrict China, the faster China will progress. Whether it is a lithography machine or a chip, we will break through, let's wait and see.