Foreign media insights: TSMC, Samsung, and ASML suddenly "changed their minds".
Tablets are becoming more and more important and have become a strategic commodity. Because of the first-mover advantage, the United States is very leading in the field of tablet computers and has consumed a lot of dividends, but it is not satisfied, and it is still hindering the development of China's tablet computers.
To this end, the United States has imposed a series of restrictions on the production of tablets, but also does not hesitate to turn to allies. However, the United States has used its corporate allies as leeks and seized the opportunity to suppress them together. As a result, TSMC, Samsung, and ASML began to change their faces!
The first is TSMC. TSMC has the world's most advanced wafer foundry technology, although it occupies more than half of the market share, but in the face of the continuous revision of wafer rules in the United States, TSMC can only be said to follow the regulatory rules of the United States.
For this, TSMC lost its second largest customer, Huawei, as well as other orders from Chinese and Russian companies.
While TSMC is not short of orders and may soon get them back, it is increasingly reliant on American companies, especially when it has to build factories in the United States. Even if the cost of building a factory in the United States is too high to be commercially viable, TSMC has to accept it.
Although TSMC has built a 5nm chip factory in the United States and plans to build another 3nm factory, the investment amount has risen to $43.5 billion, but in the end it is not its own person. Some time ago, a former American executive revealed that TSMC will be destroyed at a critical moment.
At the same time, many U.S. shareholders have withdrawn their investments, Apple, Intel, Nvidia and others have also cut orders significantly, and the chip subsidy protection rules are strict. As a result, TSMC postponed the overall construction and equipment installation schedule of the U.S. plant.
Instead, TSMC began to speed up the construction of a second factory in Japan, and also chose to build a factory in Dresden, Germany, in Europe.
This is followed by Samsung. As a wafer foundry second only to TSMC, Samsung was also invited to build a factory in the United States, but TSMC is also facing the problem of high costs. Previously, Samsung decided to invest $17 billion in the United States.
Now, Reuters, citing two sources familiar with the situation, said that Samsung's investment in building a factory in the United States is expected to exceed $8 billion, and the result will exceed $25 billion. For Samsung, the cost increase is not the most important issue.
The key is the share of chip subsidies that the United States has promised before, but now the United States has a lot of rules for subsidy applicants.
These rules could lead to financial espionage, technology breaches, and the sharing of excess profits with the United States in the future. In addition, Chinese mainland cannot build or expand advanced processes for ten years after receiving subsidies, which has a great impact on Samsung.
TSMC only has mature processes in Chinese mainland, while Samsung's storage capacity in Chinese mainland is considered advanced technology, which is directly affected.
As a result, Samsung began to hesitate to apply for subsidies, but also sent people to the United States to communicate. At the same time, Samsung announced some time ago that it would build five new chip factories in South Korea to build the world's largest semiconductor manufacturing base, which will compete with the United States.
Also, there's the ASML aspect. As the world's largest lithography machine giant, ASML has become the focus of attention due to the restrictions on wafer production in the United States, and before that, ASML was unable to ship EUV lithography machines to Chinese companies due to the obstruction of the United States.
Although we are unable to carry out high-end processes at present, and the demand for EUV lithography machines is not very large, if it were not for the United States to restrict EUV shipments, I am afraid that SMIC would have already passed the 7nm or more advanced process, and the demand for EUV would be increasing.
In this regard, ASML has already borne the losses on its own, and then only relies on DUV lithography machines to make layouts and compete for the mainland market.
However, the US side is not satisfied with this as the chip limit continues to increase, so it wants ASML to restrict DUV lithography. To this end, the United States has roped in Japan and the Netherlands to jointly impose restrictions, and the three sides have reached a certain agreement.
Some time ago, the Netherlands revealed that it will work with the United States to impose restrictions on the export of advanced semiconductor technology, and plans to implement it before this summer. ASML took note of this and was the first to issue a statement that was the first to define the scope of the restrictions mentioned by the Netherlands.
ASML said the restrictions in the Netherlands do not apply to all immersion lithography machines, with one model being able to ship normally.
In the face of the world's largest semiconductor market, TSMC, Samsung, and ASML, which do not want to give up but are subject to the United States, must also bear the losses caused by the restrictions of the United States alone
Therefore, Zhang Zhongmou has repeatedly said that globalization and freedom** are dead, and it is impossible for the United States to succeed in chip manufacturing. The president of ASML said that the restrictions will only lead to the disruption of the global ** chain and take away the technological progress of the Chinese side. Samsung also called for active communication at the top level.
For the above three parties, some foreign media directly said that TSMC, Samsung and ASML have begun to change their faces!