According to the latest report recently released by SEMI (International Semiconductor Industry Association), the total sales of global semiconductor manufacturing equipment will reach $100 billion in 2023, a year-on-year decrease of 6.1%. However, looking forward to the future development trend, SEMI predicts that the semiconductor manufacturing equipment market will usher in a market recovery next year, driven by the front-end and back-end processes.
Overall, the industry generally believes that although the performance of the semiconductor market this year is less than expected, they are optimistic about future growth. At the same time, due to the continuous localization of chips in China, the domestic semiconductor equipment industry has entered a growth period this year, and ushered in a financing wave in the first half of this year. The electronic enthusiast network sorted out the investment and financing situation of the semiconductor equipment market in the second half of this year (July to the present) and saw that many start-up semiconductor equipment companies have received the attention of the capital market and obtained a new round of financing.
Chart: Financing events in the semiconductor equipment sector in the second half of 2023
The domestic semiconductor equipment industry chain tends to be perfect, and the testing equipment market has attracted capital attention
Semiconductor equipment can be divided into two categories: front-end process equipment (wafer manufacturing) and back-end process equipment (including packaging equipment and testing equipment) according to the application links of the industrial chain, and the front-end process equipment accounts for about eighty percent of the global semiconductor equipment market. The front-end equipment of wafer manufacturing includes lithography machines, etching equipment, ICP, thin film deposition, measurement equipment, etc., the back-end packaging equipment includes placement machines, dicing machines/monitoring equipment, electroplating equipment, etc., and the back-end test equipment includes SoC testing machines, memory testing machines, RF testing machines, and analog testing machines.
According to the incomplete statistics of the electronic enthusiast network, a total of 27 semiconductor equipment companies have completed financing since July in the second half of the year, including semiconductor thin film deposition equipment, chip packaging and testing equipment, testing equipment, testing equipment manufacturers, and second-hand equipment manufacturers, involving different subdivisions such as third-generation semiconductors, new energy, and display.
From the perspective of public financing amount, there are 9 companies with more than 100 million yuan/about 100 million yuan, including Xinrui Technology, Xinju Semiconductor, Bitong Semiconductor, Weijian Intelligence, Jiyi Technology, Chenxin Technology, Weichong Semiconductor, Youruipu Semiconductor, and Xinyecheng Intelligent Equipment. Among them, the financing amount of Bitong Semiconductor is about 500 million yuan.
Founded in 2008, Majestic Semiconductor is a domestic R&D and manufacturing enterprise of semiconductor thin film deposition equipment. According to the official introduction, the company's products include 12-inch and 8-inch thin film deposition equipment, including 12-inch PECVD, SACVD, magnetron sputtering PVD, RF sputtering PVD, reactive ion sputtering PVD, Thermal ALD products, which can be manufactured by SiC, GaN, IGBT, MOSFET and other power chips, and create differentiated advantages in the market.
According to the data, Maxim Semiconductor has completed 4 rounds of financing, including 130,000 US dollars in angel round financing in July and November 2015, and 30 million yuan in Series A financing. In May 2011, it completed a B+ round of financing of 100 million yuan.
In the global wafer manufacturing front-end equipment market in 2022, thin film deposition equipment accounted for 24% of the market share, ranking third only after lithography machines and etching equipment. In the future, with the increase of advanced process production lines, the thin film deposition equipment market will continue to expand.
In the global back-end packaging equipment market in 2022, dicing machines/inspection equipment accounted for 28% of the market size, second only to placement machines, and are the second largest market segment for back-end packaging equipment. In the statistics of this financing event, it can be seen that there are many testing equipment manufacturers and test equipment manufacturers.
Testing equipment manufacturers include 8 manufacturers, including Zhizhen Precision, Nasheng Electronics, Yibei Technology, Suzhou Boge Technology, Yuanneng Technology, Weichong Semiconductor, Tsugami Intelligent Manufacturing, Fabosi, etc., involving optoelectronic functional thin film manufacturing equipment and testing equipment, semiconductor wafer-level testing equipment, advanced instruments in the field of microprocessing and testing, IGBT automatic production, ultrasonic testing equipment, etc.
Focusing on the field of electronic materials and equipment, Nasheng Electronics has launched flexible test equipment, printed electronic coating equipment, hydrogen battery coating equipment and other products in the field of equipment. Suzhou Bourg Technology focuses on advanced instruments in the field of microfabrication and testing, and its products include magneto-optical testing equipment, electrical testing systems and accessories, microscope core components, etc., creating the advantages of microfabrication and detection closed-loop, and the products can be used in scientific research needs, mask manufacturing, advanced packaging, MEMS manufacturing and other testing and processing fields.
Fabosi's Series A financing completed in September this year has received investment from Intel and ARM, and its products include substrate inspection equipment, wafer-level advanced packaging testing equipment, which can detect the geometry and defects of third-generation semiconductor substrates, and its products have been supplied to SMIC, JCET, ASE and so on. It is understood that Fabosi will also lay out the front-end defect detection and topography testing equipment.
Test equipment manufacturers include Pengwu Electronics, Chenxin Technology, Youruipu Semiconductor, etc. Pengwu Electronics is an integrated circuit automatic test equipment (ATE) supplier, the completion of tens of millions of yuan of A round of financing, the company said that the financing funds will be used for Pengwu Electronics general-purpose "P series" new product research and development, expand the product series.
At present, Pengwu Electronics focuses on the pure digital IC and digital-analog hybrid IC, high-precision analog chip testing market. The products include P1, which focuses on low-pin, high-performance, and PXI customization requirements, and P2, which focuses on large-configuration, high-parallel testing, and high-output requirements, which have competitive advantages in test efficiency and test cost. Gu Chenpeng, CEO of Pengwu Electronics, said in an interview with industry media that the complete set of P2 and high-speed digital instrument HSS10G solutions can test high-speed chips up to 10Gbps.
New companies are emerging, and the early financing of the domestic semiconductor equipment market is hot
In terms of financing rounds, as the domestic semiconductor equipment market is still in the initial stage of development, the financing stage of enterprises is basically in the A round and B round. Among them, Jiyi Technology has completed 8 rounds of financing, and the strategic financing completed in October this year is more than 100 million yuan.
Jiyi Technology mainly provides plasma equipment and vacuum thermal technology equipment, which can be used for a variety of processes such as degumming, cleaning, etching, nitriding, furnace tube thin film deposition and other industries in compound semiconductor manufacturing, silicon-based semiconductor manufacturing, semiconductor packaging, LED chips and other fields. In the 8 financing events of Jiyi Technology, the public financing amount reached tens of millions of yuan, or even hundreds of millions of yuan.
Judging from the establishment time, it can be found that most of the semiconductor equipment companies in this statistics have not been established for a long time. Founded before 2010, Majestic Semiconductor, founded in 2008, is a senior industry "veteran" among the manufacturers in this statistics.
The latest company is Qingtian Hengren, which was established in 2022 and focuses on semiconductor front-end electron beam measurement CD-SEM equipment. CD-SEM refers to the critical size scanning electron microscope, and at present, international companies such as KLA (Kelei), Hitachi Hi-Tech, Applied Materials, and TCK are the mainstream enterprises in the field of global quantitative testing. In China, in addition to Qingtian Hengten, there are also Dongfang Jingyuan, Shanghai Jingce, Suzhou Silicon Vision, etc., which have laid out the CD-SEM market.
There were 5 companies established in 2021, 6 in 2020 and 13 from 2015 to 2019. This also shows that in recent years, many new companies have emerged in the domestic semiconductor equipment market.
Chart: Number of semiconductor equipment companies established in different time periods
Homogenization is not a good thing in this market, especially for new companies, so through the table above where the financing events are summarized, you can also see that they are focusing on different semiconductor equipment segments. It can be expected that in the future, the domestic semiconductor equipment market will be further refined, and both big players and new players will deepen their respective technical advantages.
Brief summary:
From the perspective of statistical enterprises, manufacturers in different links of the semiconductor equipment industry chain, whether it is front-end equipment or back-end packaging, have achieved financing this year, which also shows that the domestic equipment industry chain is gradually improving, and there will be further room for growth in the future with the increase in market demand brought by chip localization.
In addition to the companies that have obtained financing, there are currently many semiconductor equipment companies sprinting to the capital market to seek listing, such as Keplin, Feishide, Pioneer Precision, Hongtai Semiconductor and so on. They will all maintain growth in the context of market demand, favorable policies, and capital support.