The effort that Chinese lithography equipment manufacturers are making to develop their own cutting-edge machines is titanic. And, as expected, Xi Jinping’s government is supporting these companies with multimillion-dollar subsidies. In fact, at the beginning of September 2023 it approved a game of no less than 41 billion dollars intended, precisely, for the companies that produce the equipment involved in the manufacturing of integrated circuits.

The achievements are already coming, and they are notable. SMIC and Huawei have opted, at least for now, to refine their lithographic processes and optimize UVP lithography machines (deep ultraviolet) manufactured by ASML that they already have in their possession. Other companies, however, have chosen to develop their integration technologies relying on the new equipment that Naura Technology, AMEC (Advanced Micro-Fabrication Equipment Inc. China) or Piotech Inc. have been developed. This is the path that is following Yangtze Memory Technologies Co. (YMTC), China’s largest memory chip manufacturer.

In any case, the medium-term goal of the Chinese Government is for its semiconductor manufacturers to have their own extreme ultraviolet lithography equipment (UVE), which are the most advanced currently available. The problem is that developing all the components these machines require internally is extremely complicated. In fact, ASML, which is the only company on the planet that has them (although the Russian government assures that its scientists have also managed to fine-tune them), it took more than a decade to design and manufacture such complex chip production equipment.

Dissenting voices emerge in China

Wei Shaojun is a professor of integrated circuit design at Tsinghua University in Beijing (China), as well as vice president of the Chinese Semiconductor Industry Association. This engineer is, without a doubt, one of the greatest chip experts in the country led by Xi Jinping, so his opinions have the necessary authority to be taken into account. In fact, SCMP has collected them in an article in which Shaojun, surprisingly, defends a different strategy than the one supported by the Chinese Government.

“The time has come for us to commit to developing our own technological ecosystem […] Foreign cutting-edge resources They are now out of China’s reach. […] The variety of manufacturing technologies available to us is no longer as diverse as it once was,” Shaojun defended just five days ago during his speech at the China Integrated Circuit Design Industry Exhibition held in Shanghai.

The significance of his words is greater than we can intuit if we do not read between the lines. This technician has firmly stated that China has to innovate in semiconductor design if it does not want to be left behind in the global market. And to achieve it, according to Shaojunit is necessary for its integrated circuit companies to develop their own microsystem integration architectures and technologies. In his speech he does not talk about cutting-edge lithography equipment, and he certainly does not do so because he is fully aware that in this area it will take several years for China to have the capacity to compete with the US and its allies. And there is no time to waste when falling behind is not an option.

Image | ASML

More information | SCMP

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