The global computer chip industry has become more interesting than one might think, with two reasons for relevance: First, as Moore’s Law approaches its limit, computer chip manufacturing has become an incredibly complex process that pushes the world’s most talented engineers to

The global computer chip industry has become more interesting than people think, with two reasons related to each other:

First, as Moore's Law approaches its limit, computer chip manufacturing has become an incredibly complex process that pushes the world's most talented engineers to the edge of their capabilities; since it's almost difficult to make greater technological advances now, few companies have the ability to compete. Secondly, the annual output value of the industry is about US$600 billion, making it an extremely concentrated industry. What is particularly incredible is that most of the semiconductor in the world are produced on this small island of Taiwan. This puts the industry in a very delicate balance. These chips are everywhere in modern life, and you use billions of transistors when you read this article on your phone or computer, which means that the normal functioning of the global economy depends on the maintenance of this delicate balance.

Another notable aspect of the industry is its rapid development. It has been less than 100 years since the first transistor was announced by Bell Labs, the US has announced the invention of the first transistor.

Just now, in this kind of transistor, the current can be amplified and switched with three chips of silicon. Another decade later, scientists discovered that multiple transistors could be assembled on the same sheet of paper to create integrated circuits. Such circuits were quickly called "chips" because they were all cut from a larger piece of silicon. Since then, chip designers have been seeking to inject more and more computing power into every chip. In 1975, one of the first generation of chip designers, Gordon Moore ( Gordon Moore ), proposed the famous Moore's law, that the number of transistors on each integrated circuit will double every two years. This law has now become the standard in the industry.

For decades, companies such as Intel and Samsung have successively invested billions of dollars in research and development to design more powerful chips to meet the huge consumer, commercial and military needs of increasingly complex electronic products. However, as engineers approach the limits of Moore's Law, it becomes increasingly difficult to maintain the exponential growth predicted by moore . For example, a fundamental element of this technology is lithography, which is the practice of using light to print or remove materials to shape chips. By the beginning of the 21st century, the chips became so small that even super-strong light could not provide the required accuracy.

In the book " Chip War" , the author Chris Miller cleverly weaves the science, economic and political history of computer chips together. The Dutch ASML, which is at the forefront of lithography technology, began to explore the possibility of using extreme ultraviolet rays (EUV) in the mid-1980s. The wavelength of EUV is 13.5 nanometers, which is about 15 times that of ordinary ultraviolet rays. This manufacturing process is too complicated and almost incredible that light generation requires the emission of a tin ball, which uses lasers to move quickly in a vacuum, turning it into a liquid metal that is many times hotter than the surface of the sun. According to Miller, this process is performed 50,000 times per second to generate enough EUV light to make the chip. Each laser alone requires nearly 500,000 components, and the cost per EUV machine is US$100 million, making it the "most expensive mass-produced machine tool in history."

Since chip production has become so specialized and requires such expensive equipment, the only way to make money in this industry is mass production. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) almost monopolized the market. TSMC alone produces about 85% of the world's thinnest and most advanced chips, supplying smartphones and other devices.

Taiwan’s dominance in chip manufacturing, as well as TSMC’s success, is attributed to the political and business vision of some people. For US partners, Taiwan provides lower labor costs and a transparent business environment.Texas Instruments (Texas Instruments, TI)'s first chip assembly plant opened in Taiwan in 1969, and the other was run by Morris Chang, a former executive of Texas Instruments, who brought to Taiwan to develop the domestic chip industry in the 1980s. At the time, most of the leading chip companies designed and manufactured their own chips. Chang realized that this position would become untenable, as smaller transistors would require more expensive manufacturing equipment.

is proven to be correct. As TSMC buys more expensive equipment, the company was able to build a "big alliance" consisting of companies that design chips, manufacture components and sell IPs, all relying on TSMC, but none of them have the ability to compete with it in its core business. Zhang's intuition has always been very sharp. As CEO, he responded to the global financial crisis by cutting costs and personnel. However, Zhang Dazhong, who once served as chairman of TSMC, hoped that the company would become the main manufacturer of the Apple iPhone chip, and the contract for Apple iPhone belonged to Samsung at the time. He began a large-scale R&D spending. Soon, Apple switched from Samsung to TSMC.

Currently, TSMC's largest customers include several major Chinese companies including Huawei , Tencent and Alibaba , as well as foreign giants such as Apple and Amazon . The world's dependence on TSMC has made many countries feel increasingly anxious in the context of the increasingly fierce game between China and the United States. Developed countries led by the United States have also begun to build their own chip industries to get rid of their excessive dependence on TSMC. China is also vigorously developing the chip industry. Let's wait and see what the outcome of this war without gunpowder will be!