The rise of nanometers

Just after the Spring Festival of 2013, during the Lantern Festival on February 24, Dragon Totem held a global press conference at Texas Semiconductor.

Although the new treatment plan for AIDS has recently hit the Internet at home and abroad, Long Totem's sudden press conference still made many people in the industry smell something unusual.

Especially last month, Intel, Samsung and TSMC all announced the latest chip process mass production schedule.

Among them, Samsung and TSMC are both 16nm and are expected to be initially mass-produced in June this year, while Intel is 18nm and is expected to be mass-produced from April to May this year.

Dragon Totem, which has overtaken the company with its 20-22nm process, has not responded, and the outside world is also speculating about this.

Some foreign media speculated that Long Totem encountered a process bottleneck and was unable to win the 16-18nm process in the short term.

In the press conference hall of Texas Semiconductor.

Industry insiders, news media, and people joining in the fun packed the hall that can accommodate 3,000 people.

Various companies in the semiconductor industry at home and abroad have sent business observers, especially TSMC, Samsung and Intel, which have just launched new process mass production plans.

They were not as calm and calm as described by foreign media. In fact, they were panicking inside.

Intel still has a local base, but Samsung and TSMC, which have suffered serious business decline, cannot withstand the struggle.

After all, developing new processes requires investing huge amounts of R\u0026D funds. Their business has shrunk a lot, and their capital chain is also very tight. If they cannot make a comeback with new processes, they may be close to bankruptcy.

If Long Toteng came out and announced that it would mass-produce 16-18 nanometer processes, they would be more relieved. At least they could compete in terms of technology, and at worst they would make less money.

The problem is that Dragon Totem has been slow to speak out, as if it is holding back its big move, which makes other companies frightened.

At the press conference, people from various related companies gathered around each other's small circles and discussed the press conference in low voices.

Arrive at 10am.

Zhang Weixin appeared in front of everyone, and beside him was Huang Xiuyuan's stand-in robot.

The backstage staff opened the global live broadcast system and provided live broadcast services of the press conference to global users through the Time Video website in the Time Blog.

The moment the live broadcast room opened, the management of domestic and foreign semiconductor and electronics industries all entered the live broadcast room at the same time and silently watched the press conference.

Many spectators at the scene were also very surprised to see the founder of the Suiren Department, and bursts of cheers came from the scene.

Huang Xiuyuan opened his hands and said with a smile: "I am very happy to meet you here for Dragon Totem's 2013 Spring Festival new product launch conference. I hope this conference can live up to expectations."

Bang bang bang! There was thunderous applause.

"The first product Dragon Totem will launch today is a CPU, namely Fuxi 2CPU."

As soon as he finished speaking, the big screen behind him came on stage, and various performances of the Fuxi 2 CPU popped up, but the most eye-catching data was about the chip manufacturing process and the number of chip transistors.

"Oh my God!"

"14nm process?"

"Si Guoyi!"

"Smecta……"

"The number of transistors is 6.4 billion?"

"520 billion floating point operations per second!"

"Energy consumption..."

The audience at the scene exclaimed.

The competitors who were watching the live broadcast suddenly turned gloomy to the extreme. What they were most worried about appeared.

Long Totem directly gave a blow to the photolithography semiconductor companies, making their new process fall behind even before mass production.

Zhang Weixin handed a Fuxi 2CPU sandwiched in a transparent glass layer to Huang Xiuyuan.

"Fuxi 2 CPU will continue the idea of ​​the first generation product, adopt Fuxi architecture, and can be applied to computers and mobile phones. The product is officially launched today. Domestic and foreign companies are welcome to purchase our CPU chips."

Huang Xiuyuan continued with a smile: "There is also good news. The twice-optimized Fuxi 1 CPU chip will be launched in four dedicated branch versions, which are suitable for computers, mobile phones, cars, and servers. At the same time, the price has been reduced by 44%."

Damn...

A number of foreign manufacturers almost vomited blood. The original version of Fuxi 1 had significantly lowered its price, causing the profits of many photolithography chip manufacturers to plummet to less than half of their previous levels.

Fuxi 1 is now on sale at a reduced price, and Fuxi 2 occupies the high-end market. This is the rhythm of killing everyone!

Dragon Totem's new generation Fuxi CPU is not a conceptual product. The process has reached 14 nanometers and has been directly launched into mass production products.

On the other side, Intel, Samsung and TSMC have not even had time to mass-produce new processes, let alone launch mature chip products.

The earliest they can wait for the product to be released is early 2014, and the dragon totem has been sold for more than a year. The key is that their craftsmanship is higher than mine.

How to break it?

There's no way to compete.

If they knew that Dragon Totem had begun trial production of the 12nm process on a small scale and was developing the 10nm process, they would probably be even more desperate.

In fact, Dragon Totem’s 14-18nm process became technologically mature around September last year and could enter large-scale mass production.

It's just that chip design has not caught up yet, and with its own 20-22nm process, it is still a leading product on the market, so there is no need to rush to launch it.

In addition, Dragon Totem also had the idea of ​​delaying time intentionally.

After all, their own technology is now leading, and anxious competitors will definitely invest desperately in research and development funds to try to regain their leading position.

If 14-18 nanometers were launched last year, it would probably frighten competitors and make them abandon their current processes and invest funds in the research and development of 12-14 nanometers.

Sure enough, TSMC, Samsung and Intel, who worked hard, spent more than 100 billion yuan in R\u0026D funds after uniting the upstream and downstream of the photolithography semiconductor industry chain.

The fastest Intel has even laid out its production line and started debugging and small-scale trial production.

Samsung and TSMC are also not far behind, and their production lines are working overtime to set up and debug.

Then they announced the progress, hoping to restore the market and the confidence of investors. The market did what they expected, causing their stock prices to soar for more than a month.

Then, there is no more...

Dragon Totem shattered their hopes with one punch, causing their R\u0026D investment of hundreds of billions of dollars to be wasted.

Even mass production immediately will not help.

Except for Intel, which can rely on its local market barriers to keep its basic market from collapsing, Samsung and TSMC are definitely doomed.

The TSMC management who were watching the live broadcast had dark expressions on their faces.

despair! Unprecedented despair!

Their desperate gamble was vulnerable to the dragon totem.

Zhang Zhongmou's face was pale, his eyes were full of helplessness and desolation, and he murmured to himself: "We lost! We lost miserably!"

Others at TSMC also looked lonely and miserable. They had staked all of TSMC's funds and invested in the research and development of new processes. If they could not regain their leading position and get new orders, they would not be able to regain their leading position.

The consequences are almost predictable.

Once the capital chain is broken, the entire company will fall into a vicious cycle. Unless new funds are injected, it will be possible to survive.

But at this moment, who is willing to be taken advantage of and spend tens of billions of dollars to save TSMC?

Thank you for your support (ω｀)