PA视讯(中国集团)官方网站-Limited Company

The United States has been restricting the development of China's chip industry by jamming chip equipment.

Because chip manufacturing requires hundreds of types of equipment, none of which can be dispensed with, and China's own equipment technology is relatively backward, the United States believes that by blocking the sale of advanced equipment to China, it can hold back China's chip industry.

To this end, he allied with the Netherlands and Japan to restrict the sale of advanced equipment.

Under such circumstances, what can we do? We can only grit our teeth and work with domestic supply chains to carry out domestic substitution.

Because others are trying to strangle you, leaving you without food, what else can you do but rely on domestic substitutes? Even if the domestic technology is a bit inferior and the ecosystem is a bit weaker, we have to bite the bullet and use it more. With increased revenue and market share, technology will naturally break through and the ecosystem will improve.

Therefore, the wafer fabs and domestic semiconductor equipment manufacturers worked together, starting with low-end and easily substitutable products, and gradually moving towards mid- and high-end products that are difficult to substitute, taking one step at a time.

Data shows that in 2017, the localization rate of domestic chip equipment was less than 10%, with approximately 4% in the front-end and 18% in the back-end. By 2021, it had reached around 15%, with 10% in the front-end and 19% in the back-end.

By 2025, the front-end process will reach 21%, while the back-end process will reach 36%, with the overall proportion hovering around 25-28%.

According to the forecast by the institution, by 2026, the overall localization rate is expected to reach over 40%, with the front-end localization rate exceeding 30% and the back-end localization rate potentially surpassing 50%.

Specifically, the localization rate of cleaning equipment will exceed 30%, etching equipment will exceed 35%, and CMP equipment will exceed 40%. Additionally, for processes at 28nm and above, the localization rate will be as high as over 35%.

Especially for some newly established production lines, if the process is 28nm or above, the localization rate of equipment will exceed 60%, with most equipment being domestically produced. For older equipment, due to compatibility issues with other equipment, the localization rate may be slightly lower.

I think such an outcome is something the United States never expected. After all, they thought that by locking down chip equipment, they would be able to lock down China's semiconductor industry. Little did they know that this would actually force us to make breakthroughs in chip equipment.

And with our continuous breakthroughs, the United States will no longer be able to lock us in when it comes to chip equipment in the future.

Of course, then again, in the field of chip equipment, our domestic products are still mainly at the mid-to-low end. Some advanced equipment, especially those with processes below 7nm, is still not feasible, and we still rely heavily on imports.

Especially in terms of lithography machines, we are still far behind ASML. This is also our next goal to strive for. Otherwise, if others can block one lithography machine, it's equivalent to blocking all of them.