Two hundred trained assistant semiconductor technicians sign labor contracts with the company and must work for ten years before leaving TTFAB.
Toshiba Semiconductor is not unserious, as this is related to TTFAB's process technology and yield rate.
In this era, an investment of US$180 million is not a small amount for Toshiba Semiconductor Equipment Company.
This is the benefit of a Sino-Japanese joint venture!
The fifteen lithography machines on the six-inch wafer and 1um process production line produced by Toshiba Semiconductor Equipment Company are produced by Nikon Semiconductor Equipment Company. When Sun Jian saw them, he immediately thought of ASML, the lithography machine overlord in his previous life.
Since the establishment of a joint venture with Toshiba Semiconductor Equipment Company, Sun Jian spent more than a month in the data room of Shanghai Guozhi Communication Semiconductor Research Institute, where he gained some knowledge about the semiconductor industry chain of photolithography machines.
The semiconductor industry chain mainly includes IC design, wafer manufacturing, packaging and testing. The pre-process is mainly circuit design and wafer processing, and ICs are designed and produced on media such as silicon wafers. The post-process is divided into parts containing integrated circuits. Starting from the wafer, IC products are made through processes such as cutting, packaging and testing.
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The three major equipments of photolithography, etching, and thin film deposition have become the main force promoting the development of advanced IC processes, accounting for 65% of semiconductor wafer processing equipment.
In order to improve the chip production process and unit productivity per hour (WPH), a wafer factory (FAB) is generally equipped with about twenty photolithography machines on an advanced semiconductor production line, and they are high and low, except for the bottom transistor layer. In addition to the need for the most advanced photolithography machines, the copper interconnection technology does not require the most advanced photolithography machines.
In the semiconductor production line, the processes of silicon wafer cleaning, oxidation and coating, cleaning, glue coating, drying, photolithography, development and glue washing, etching, glue removal, ion implantation and diffusion, cleaning, thin film, chemical mechanical polishing, etc. are complex. , there are many processes, some of which are cycled dozens of times. In addition to the photolithography machine, which accounts for one-third of the cost of the semiconductor production line, cleaning equipment, high-temperature/oxidation furnace tube annealing equipment, glue leveling machines, and drying equipment are also required. , developing equipment, etching machines, glue removers, ion implantation equipment, CVD/PVD/ALD/PECVD/CMP and other high-precision equipment. The largest number are deposition equipment (including PVD CVD), etching equipment (ICP, CCP, DIE) and heat treatment equipment (RTP).
Seventy percent of the high-end equipment in the semiconductor production lines produced by Toshiba Semiconductor Equipment Company is ordered from other manufacturers and then integrated into the system.
Photolithography defines the size of the transistor. The photolithography process is the most critical, complex and time-consuming step in IC manufacturing. It is the core process in IC production and accounts for about 50% of the time spent in wafer manufacturing.
Semiconductor processes and technologies are complex, and reducing IC size requires industry-wide investment.
In 1985, the 45th Institute of the Ministry of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering successfully developed the BG-101 stepper lithography machine, and its main performance indicators were close to or reaching the level of GCA's 4800DSW system; in the same year, the Shanghai Institute of Optics and Precision Machinery of the Chinese Academy of Sciences successfully developed the "scanning type The "projection lithography machine" has passed the appraisal and is considered to have reached the level of GCA's 4800DSW, filling a gap in my country's large-scale integrated circuit special equipment.
In the mid-to-late 1980s, domestic companies began to introduce large-scale foreign investment and establish semiconductor joint ventures. With the thinking of "buying is worse than building, and renting is worse than buying," lithography technology and industrialization have stagnated.
The semiconductor industry chain is a large and complex systematic project, which requires comprehensive national strength and technological level as the basis. It is often sanctioned by Western countries led by the United States. In previous lives, the entire country failed to catch up with the United States and Japan and fell behind. Behind Korea.
The Reborn intends to make a difference in communication chips and will not be so arrogant as to produce EUV lithography machines on its own.
I learned from Li Guoliang and Liu Yuhong that there are at least dozens of companies that can produce lithography machines today. The high-end lithography machine market is monopolized by Nikon. Nikon alone has 40% of the lithography machine market share. Intel , IBM, AMD and Texas Instruments are all major customers of Nikon lithography machines; GCA, Canon, SVG and Ultratech are in the second echelon, and P&E, Hitachi and ASML are in the third echelon.
Sun Jian immediately instructed Yu Jianguo to send people to Eindhoven, the Netherlands, to contact ASML to see if there were any opportunities to invest in equity?
Dawn Investment Company (TIC), registered in the Cayman Islands, is willing to invest in ASML's equity.
Yu Jianguo sent Xiang Dongping and Guo Yuchen, who were exploring the German software market, to temporarily put down their work and go to Eindhoven, the Netherlands, to contact ASML.
Xiang Dongping and Guo Yuchen began to learn the basic knowledge of photolithography machines and chip production, and collected information on ASML, Nikon, GCA, Canon and SVG.
The principle of a photolithography machine is as simple as a slide projector. It projects light through a mask with a circuit diagram (also called a photomask) onto a wafer coated with photosensitive adhesive.
In photolithography in the 1960s, the mask was attached to the wafer in a 1:1 size. At that time, the wafer was only one inch in size. The photolithography machine was not high-tech at the time. Semiconductor companies usually designed their own tooling and tools. , Intel initially bought 16mm camera lenses and disassembled them.
In the early 1980s, Philips encountered a business crisis and planned to abandon its non-core business and sell its lithography machine business to a leading American company or to a rising Japanese lithography machine company.
Prado, the founder of ASM, has always wanted to cooperate with Philips. After lengthy negotiations, the lithography machine business was independent from Philips Semiconductor Equipment Company. In 1984, a joint venture (ASML) was established with a registered capital of US$4.4 million. As the leader of the project, ASM obtained 40% of the shares, while Philips and MIP (private equity funds) each obtained 30% of the shares.
The R&D and management team led by Prado has ambitious goals and is to be the world's number one lithography machine.
In recent years, affected by the downturn in the world's semiconductor industry, ASML has suffered losses for two consecutive years. MIP, which holds 30% of the shares, plans to withdraw and asks for US$20 million. Xiang Dongping offered US$15 million on behalf of Xiangjiang Shuguang Investment Company, and finally reached an agreement. Transaction intent of $18 million.
Eighteen million US dollars is equivalent to nearly 150 million yuan, which is not a small sum. If Shanghai Shuguang Communication Technology Company comes forward to purchase equity, it will still need approval from the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation.
Yu Jianguo came forward and signed a provisional agreement on the transfer of 30% of ASML equity with MIP General Manager Brown on behalf of TIC.
TIC is an investment company registered in the Cayman Islands two years ago. The legal person Sun Jian is also the controlling shareholder of Kunpeng Software Company. He has strong financial resources and does not participate in the daily operation and management of ASML. He does not seek to control ASML and serves as a strategic equity investor in ASML.
Kunpeng Software Company is also a member of the Business Software Alliance. It currently accounts for 70% of China's computer operating system share and 20% of the world's computer operating system market, and its reputation is at its peak.
With the participation of an investment company with an international computer software company background, ASML can also cooperate in software. ASM and Philips agreed that MIP would transfer its 30% ASML equity to Shuguang Investment Company.
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"Do, d,!"
Witnessed by ASM Chairman and President Prado and Philips General Manager Richard, Sun Jian and MIP General Manager Brown signed a formal agreement to transfer 30% of ASML equity.
Through an HSBC bank account, he paid US$18 million and obtained the legal documents for 30% of ASML's equity.
TIC has equity in a second company.
