In recent years, the United States has continued to impose chip restrictions on us, because with the continuous development of science and technology, chips are related to high-tech progress. However, because of its early development, the United States has an advantage in chip-related aspects, and does not want to see us progress.
However, what the United States did not expect is that although the United States continues to increase chip restrictions, the results have not stopped the development of our chips.
First of all, in terms of chip equipment, the US containment plan has basically failed. The main reason why the United States was able to impose restrictions on our chips is that it leads in semiconductor manufacturing equipment, accounting for about 40% of the world's share.
In addition, Japan occupies 30%, the Netherlands occupies 20%, and the three together occupy about 90% of the share, and the global semiconductor manufacturing equipment is basically monopolized by the United States, Japan and the Netherlands. The point is that the equipment in Japan and the Netherlands is still inseparable from American technology.
Therefore, the United States can win over Japan and the Netherlands to reach a tripartite agreement to force them to jointly implement export controls on semiconductor equipment.
However, the U.S. side does not seem to have expected that the tighter their chip restrictions are, the more semiconductor equipment manufacturers will accelerate shipments to the mainland. For example, ASML in the Netherlands will have 14% revenue from the mainland in 2022 and 29% in 2023.
There is also Tokyo Electron, Japan's largest semiconductor equipment manufacturer, whose revenue from the mainland will reach about 44% in 2023.
Not only Japanese and Dutch companies, but also the three major semiconductor equipment manufacturers in the United States are no exception, Applied Materials, Lam Research Group, and Kelei will all have significant revenue from the mainland in 2023, with more than 40% in the fourth quarter and more than 30% for the whole year.
Because the United States continues to tighten chip restrictions, the mainland has begun to accelerate the expansion of chip production lines. To this end, relevant manufacturers seize all available opportunities to purchase as much equipment as possible in advance, and foreign equipment manufacturers are naturally willing to ship.
This can prepare for the chip expansion in the next few years, and can also buy a certain amount of time for domestic equipment to move forward.
It is worth mentioning that domestic semiconductor equipment manufacturers are also working very hard. Previously, the world's top ten semiconductor equipment manufacturers were basically American, Japanese and Dutch companies, including the three major equipment manufacturers in the United States mentioned above, ASML and Tokyo Electron.
For many years, the equipment we need to manufacture chips mainly comes from foreign equipment manufacturers, and the import of advanced equipment has been restricted. To this end, our related enterprises are also actively researching and developing, striving to break the foreign blockade in semiconductor equipment.
Recently, the good news came that domestic semiconductor equipment manufacturers entered the top ten in the world for the first time and rushed to the eighth place in the world.
This company is the largest semiconductor equipment manufacturer in China, NAURA Huachuang, which has successfully broken the monopoly of the United States, Japan and the Netherlands for many years, and has become the only company in the mainland to enter the TOP10, and finally opened a gap in semiconductor manufacturing equipment.
Secondly, in terms of chip production capacity, the United States may not be able to do without us in the future. The US imposes chip restrictions in order to choke our necks in terms of chips, affect our high-tech development, and make it impossible for us to catch up or slow down.
However, the US side ignores an important issue, that is, the current mainstream demand for chips is mature processes, which account for about 70%. The U.S. can only limit the advanced process, while the mature process cannot be stopped at all.
Today, we are focusing on the development of mature processes, for example, SMIC has built 4 new mature process fabs in a row.
Although the share of chip shipments accounts for nearly 50% of the world, its own production capacity only accounts for about 10% of the world, and giants such as Apple, Qualcomm, and Nvidia rely on TSMC and Samsung.
According to relevant institutions, the mainland chip production capacity will account for about 30% of the world in 2024, and the mature process production capacity will account for about 40% of the world in 2025, ranking first in the world.
Needless to say, our cost advantage will lead the mature process, and the United States will probably have to rely on mainland manufacturing at that time.
This is not that the author is blindly analyzing, even the chip experts in the United States said that if the current trend continues, the United States will eventually have to rely on the mainland's chip industry, because the American chip manufacturers simply cannot roll up the mainland manufacturers.
Although the United States has come up with $52 billion in chip subsidies, there has been no significant progress in the past three years, even if the advanced process chips are self-produced, the mature process still depends on external processes, and the mainland will have an advantage in this regard.
In this regard, some foreign media said that the situation suddenly reversed, China's chip progress is so fast, the US restrictions cannot be stopped at all!