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In recent years, the United States has continued to suppress China's semiconductor industry. In addition to its alliance with Japan, the Netherlands has also signed a so-called "tripartite agreement" to control China's semiconductor equipment, which involves exposure and tempering equipment for the 45-nanometer process. This has also led the Netherlands to restrict exports of lithography machines to China. This behavior of the United States has brought great blows and difficulties to China's semiconductor industry.
However, the United States does not intend to stop there. Recently, according to relevant reports, Biden intends to invoke the rules of the Liberal Democratic Party to impose a complete blockade on equipment involving American technology. The measure is aimed at discouraging Chinese companies from buying any type of lithography equipment. This method of the United States can be described as extremely vicious, because due to the extensive equipment control of the United States, the development of China's semiconductor industry may be stagnant for up to 10 years. The United States basically wants to stifle China's semiconductor industry.
But today is different. In the face of such unreasonable suppression and major crises, China will naturally not swallow its anger. After repeated warnings and fruitless negotiations, China's Ministry of Commerce officially announced that China will begin to control the export of gallium and germanium from August 1. This killing move really made many Western countries jump. But Biden's latest news makes people believe that China's control of cutting off the supply of gallium and germanium has failed. What happens?
First, let's analyze the impact of gallium and germanium on the semiconductor industry. Gallium and germanium are two metals indispensable in chip manufacturing and are one of the key materials for the production of high-end chips. Their physical and electrical properties allow them to support and provide stable structures, so they are widely used. In addition, in the military field, germanium and gallium are also important raw materials for the production of advanced military weapons. It can be said that gallium and germanium are important prerequisites for the development of the semiconductor industry, and are extremely important for countries that want to develop the semiconductor industry.
However, from the perspective of distribution, the resources of gallium and germanium are relatively limited, which belongs to the situation of more people and less meat. Among the few countries rich in reserves, China is the world's largest producer of gallium and germanium. It has a large number of gallium and germanium mineral resources. China accounts for 95% of global gallium production, which contributes 67% to germanium production. For years, Western countries, including the United States, have relied on China's gallium and germanium supply chains to ensure the development of their chip industries. Therefore, China's production cuts have undoubtedly stifled the development of its semiconductor industry.
In this regard, foreign media have said that this "science and technology war" may evolve into a big war.
The United States and other Western countries are very eager to get angry. On the one hand, they are eager to protest China's export controls, and on the other hand, they are looking around the world for other sources of gallium and germanium metal. At the same time, the United States seems to have found a way to break gallium and germanium controls.
Previously, in order to stabilize US semiconductor companies, Biden officially announced that he would unite with the Department of Commerce and related industry giants to jointly seek solutions to supply problems. Eventually, the United States found a way to "collect scrap" and quickly obtain gallium metal in a short period of time. But why does the United States only need to solve the problem of obtaining gallium metal?
The reason is that of the 8,600 tons of germanium reserves in the world, the germanium content of the United States is 3,870 tons, even exceeding China's 3,500 tons. Therefore, after the United States is cut off by China, as long as it fully exploits germanium ore, it can largely meet its own demand for metal germanium. Therefore, China's control of germanium does not frighten the United States.
But by contrast, it is not so simple for the United States to get rid of its dependence on the continental gallium metal. First, 95% of gallium production comes from China, and the United States has no access to gallium mineral resources. Secondly, the process and technology for extracting and smelting gallium metal is relatively complex. At present, no country in the world can match China, and the United States cannot achieve the rapid development of extraction technology in a short period of time.
Therefore, the only way the United States is currently looking for is to "collect waste". The so-called "waste collection" refers to the recovery of gasium-containing waste products such as tailings from existing waste streams, and after collecting a certain amount, it can be recycled and processed to extract relatively pure metal gallium. Only in this way can a large amount of gallium be obtained in a short period of time and get rid of the dependence of the United States on imported gallium metal.
However, while this approach is feasible and not difficult to implement, it seems to be far from meeting the demand for gallium metal in the United States. Because this solution can only be extracted from waste generated during semiconductor wafer manufacturing or equipment containing gallium, the amount of gallium-containing waste is far lower than the demand for gallium in the United States, although all waste is collected to refinery waste can only meet the temporary needs of the United States to produce chips, can not meet the long-term development needs of the United States. "Waste recycling and refining" cannot fundamentally change the import demand for gallium and germanium in the West. Therefore, the United States will probably continue to look for other ways to obtain gallium metal.
The gallium metal mining problem encountered by the United States this time is also its own fault. If it were not for the United States' relentless control measures, which almost pushed China into a desperate situation, China, which has always loved peace, freedom, equality and mutual assistance for development, would not have launched such a fatal counterattack. Therefore, in an integrated international environment, any action affects itself, and neither party can be completely independent of the world. The best way to control the United States and other Western countries this time is to relax chip restrictions on China and solve the problem from the level of cooperation.
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