lithography machine is known as the "jewel" in the crown of industry and is an indispensable device for chip manufacturing. Its importance is self-evident. In the global lithography machine market, ASML can be said to be the "overlord" and is also the only manufacturer in the world that can produce EUV lithography machines.
However, for well-known reasons, ASML has been restricted from exporting EUV equipment to mainland wafer fabs. Even if Chinese companies paid the deposit four years ago, they reached an EUV purchase agreement with ASML, the equipment has not been delivered so far with the intervention of the United States.
"One generation chip, one generation of equipment" is a consensus in the semiconductor industry. After TSMC terminated its foundry service, the reason why Huawei HiSilicon's self-developed high-end Kirin chip became a "master singer" is because the domestic market lacks high-end manufacturing materials and equipment such as EUV lithography machines, which cannot meet the process requirements.
Fortunately, although Chinese companies cannot buy EUV lithography machines used in high-end chip manufacturing processes, the DUV equipment developed by ASML can be supplied with normal quality and quantity. According to public information, in the first quarter of this year alone, ASML sold 23 DUV lithography machines in the mainland market.
For the domestic chip market, which is in the ice-breaking stage, there is actually not a big demand for EUV lithography machines, only some industries such as smartphone Soc chips can be used. In contrast, DUV equipment used in the mature process technology has always been widely used.
As Loongson engineer Hu Weiwu said, if we don’t do 5nm in the United States, we will learn to do 5nm. The 28nm/14nm chip is enough to meet more than 90.9% of applications. Compared with focusing most of the energy to tackle high-end processes, we should do more to improve the domestic production rate and optimize the system environment. This is true. For example, many key areas such as aerospace, 5G base stations, computers, and on-board systems are used in mature 28nm processes. Moreover, only by first establishing the mid- and low-end markets can domestic chips impact the high-end chip market in the next step.
In other words, the impact of the supply cut of EUV lithography machines on us is temporarily very limited. Perhaps it is because of the realization of this problem that from last year to the present, the United States has focused on DUV lithography equipment and lobbying ASML, hoping that it can tighten the shipping scope of the international mainstream demand equipment.
But what the Americans did not expect was that ASML made a "reverse" decision. In just over a year, Chinese companies have purchased 78 lithography machines from ASML, which has also made the Chinese market surpass the United States and become ASML's third largest business market in the world.
In addition, ASML is also continuing to increase its investment layout in the Chinese market. According to public information, as of the end of September, ASML has set up 15 offices in the Chinese market, and there are 3 development centers, a maintenance center and a training center. The team size has exceeded 1,500 people!
Although it needs to face pressure from the United States, it is not difficult to see from ASML's actions. It obviously believes that stabilizing the Chinese market is more critical. The reason for
is very clear. In the context of global chip shipments declining, Apple , Qualcomm and other Medium-soft chips have successively reported order cuts, which has also affected the shipment of lithography machines. For example, TSMC has been forced to shut down some EUV lithography machines to cope with the crisis of overcapacity.
Faced with this situation, ASML seems to be starting to be unable to hold on. However, compared with other regions, China's chip consumer market size remains between US$350 billion and US$400 billion per year. Driven by the trend of independent chip making, domestic wafer factories' demand for lithography machines has steadily increased.
is facing absolute interests, how could ASML be indifferent? More importantly, domestic lithography machines are accelerating breakthroughs. If ASML does not accelerate its layout, once the domestic lithography machines are put into use, what they may face may be excluded.
However, we cannot take it lightly. In the past, we have proved many times that Western companies are unreliable. Even if mainstream lithography equipment such as DUVs can be shipped freely, we cannot relax our self-development. Only by preparing for the future and being prepared for danger in times of peace can we calmly deal with various potential crises.
In this regard, Academician Ni Guangnan has also issued a warning: core technologies cannot be bought, exchanged, or requested. There is no shortcut to the rise of domestic chips. We must give up our fantasies and fully complete the domestic replacement by practicing!
