Rebirth 99 to become a car giant

"Mr. Cao, I would like to thank Nanshan Equipment for its support to Chang'an City. For this chip equipment industrial park project, I personally serve as the project team leader, so that Chang'an City can fully assist various companies in the construction of new factories as quickly as possible."

"Whether it is land, talent placement, equipment transportation, or surrounding supporting transportation, hospitals, schools, etc., relevant cooperation will be done."

After He Guangming from Modu Microelectronics and Yin Zhiqiang from China Microelectronics communicated with Pan Jinxing, the chip equipment industrial park project in Chang'an City was quickly officially determined.

Several companies have officially announced their intention to participate in this project.

In addition, in the past few days, they have received contacts from many domestic chip manufacturers one after another, asking them to inspect their production plants on site and prepare to purchase their production equipment.

This makes everyone more enthusiastic about building new factories.

Although there are not many well-known semiconductor companies in China, the number of semiconductor companies is actually quite large.

Especially in recent years, relevant departments have encouraged various capitals to enter the semiconductor industry, and various companies have sprung up like mushrooms after a rain.

Some may want to fish in troubled waters, while others may want to make some achievements.

After all, China's chip market is a huge market worth several trillion yuan.

As long as it can get a piece of the pie, a company can do well.

These semiconductor companies can make the manufacturers in the chip equipment industry alliance live a very good life.

As various equipment manufacturers officially visit Chang'an City to inspect and prepare to quickly build their own new factories, Chang'an Province will naturally take various actions.

As the person in charge, Liu Tianwu also personally called Cao Yang to express his gratitude.

"This time the relevant departments can vigorously support the development of domestic chip equipment. I heard that you also helped a lot."

"Now our equipment industry has formed a certain scale in Yangcheng and Shanghai."

"However, with the explosion of new demand, the current production capacity is definitely not enough."

"Taking this opportunity to build a brand new industrial park in Chang'an City is also very suitable for various equipment manufacturers."

Cao Yang and Liu Tianwu are old acquaintances.

Liu Tianwu had previously invited Cao Yang to let Nanshan Chemical and other manufacturers set up factories in Chang'an City, but Cao Yang did not agree at the time.

This is not because Liu Tianwu left Yangcheng and Cao Yang ignored him.

But Nanshan Chemical is really not suitable for setting up so many branch factories for the time being.

However, companies in the Nanshan Group have now started to spend a lot of money, building new factories in Magic City, Imperial City, Yangcheng and Chang'an City. Naturally, they can take this opportunity to attract a group of other companies to develop in Chang'an City. .

Although Nanshan Equipment is responsible for producing some of the most important equipment in wafer processing and chip processing, there are still many equipments that require the cooperation of other companies.

If all the equipment needed for various factories such as the entire wafer factory can be purchased in an industrial park, it will definitely be a thing worth supporting for various chip companies.

In the future, when everyone goes to inspect, they don’t need to fly all over the world. They can directly stay in Chang’an City for ten days and a half to confirm all the projects together.

Even if the new factory is built directly in Chang'an City, there will be great advantages in equipment transportation and maintenance.

It just so happens that the semiconductor industry is also the industry that Chang'an City will focus on next.

"In any case, I still have to thank Nanshan Equipment for choosing Chang'an City, otherwise this industrial park would definitely not be located in Chang'an City."

Liu Tianwu still saw things thoroughly.

China's Chip Equipment Industry Alliance is actually an organization surrounding Nanshan Equipment.

Nanshan Equipment can be said to be the leader of this alliance, and its words are definitely effective.

There is no way, who makes Nanshan Semiconductor, the brother of Nanshan Equipment, the most important customer of the Core Equipment Industry Alliance.

Nanshan Automobile Group and Honor Technology Group are the main chip users in China.

In this case, no matter which chip equipment manufacturer it is, they will choose to surround Nanshan equipment and get a piece of the pie.

After all, no matter where you are, there is always a circle.

If you are not in the circle, it will be difficult to eat the meat of the circle.

At most, many people will have leftovers to eat, so you can have a sip of soup.

Just when Nanshan Equipment came to Chang'an City with a group of equipment companies to establish an industrial park, Pan Jinxing and Xie Lingyun took Cao Yang to attend another important event.

"Mr. Cao, Nanshan Iron and Steel Gas, as a subsidiary of Nanshan Special Steel, mainly uses the tail gas produced by smelting steel at Shaogang Iron and Steel Co., Ltd. as raw material to fractionate various inert gases."

"These inert gases have a great impact on the semiconductor industry. Currently, more than 80% of the inert gases used in the domestic semiconductor industry still rely on imports."

"Although there are many import source countries, so it is not easy to get stuck, the risk is still relatively high."

"Baosteel had consulted us about the inert gas fractionation equipment two years ago. We did some research and set up a team to take charge of this business."

"Now that qualified fractionation equipment has finally been developed, most of the rare gases such as neon and helium that will be used in Nanshan semiconductor production can be supplied by Nanjing Gases."

Pan Jinxing took Caoyang Caoyang Nangang Gas Production Factory.

The tall distillation tower looks spectacular.

As an essential material in the chip production process, the importance of inert gas cannot be ignored.

Cao Yang also realized this early.

In the chip manufacturing process, in addition to key equipment and raw materials such as photolithography machines, photoresists, and silicon wafers, inert gases are also essential raw materials.

The extremely inactive chemical properties of inert gases can be used as protective gases in the production process. Among them, neon, xenon, and krypton are the most commonly used inert gases in the chip manufacturing process, which are equivalent to the blood of the semiconductor industry.

For example, neon plays a very important role in engraving circuits and refining and stabilizing chip manufacturing. Nearly 80% of the world's neon gas is used in semiconductor manufacturing.

Therefore, without inert gases, chips cannot be manufactured.

However, inert gases cannot be directly used in the production of semiconductors. They need to be used in the form of mixed gases, such as krypton-neon mixed gas, fluorine-neon mixed gas, etc. These mixed gases are also called electronic special gases.

The global electronic special gas market is mainly controlled by Air Chemicals, Deutsche Linde, Air Liquide, and Japan Solar, which together account for more than 90% of the global market share, and also account for more than 80% of China's electronic special gas market. share.

There are technical barriers to electronic special gases, which have extremely high requirements for gas purity and mixed gas ratio accuracy. As a result, many manufacturers will not easily change electronic special gas suppliers.

This also means that it is easy to get stuck.

Whether it is to prevent the United States from pulling its little brother against him again, or to prevent future conflicts that will cause the price of inert gases to skyrocket, Cao Yang feels that it is necessary to promote the local development of these electronic special gases.

Just before Nanshan Special Steel acquired Shaoguan Iron and Steel Co., Ltd., it already had some basic conditions for producing related rare gases.

However, China's steel industry is number one in the world, but it has been unable to handle most of its electronic specialties before.

This is because China cannot get the equipment to produce these gases.

If the equipment is not good, the industry will naturally not be good.

Traditional air fractionation equipment cannot effectively separate inert gases such as neon.

Take neon as an example. On the one hand, the content of neon is very low, accounting for only about one hundred thousandth in the air. On the other hand, the boiling point of neon is extremely low, similar to liquid hydrogen, and it is difficult to become a liquid.

It is difficult to obtain useful neon gas by traditional fractionation methods.

Therefore, whether it is Baosteel, Ansteel, or Shougang, they clearly know that this thing is valuable, and they produce a large amount of these gases in their own steelmaking process, but there is nothing they can do.

The Germans are relatively economical in this regard. They found that China's steel production is so large and the demand for air fractionation is also very huge. It is a pity to discharge precious neon and other inert gases back into the air.

So they took the initiative to sell primary concentrator equipment that can produce neon, etc. to some steel mills in China, and asked China to help them produce crude products.

After they buy the crude product at a low price, they then purify it to obtain high-purity neon gas, which in turn can be sold to China at a high price.

As for the high-end equipment and related technologies for purifying neon gas, they are absolutely confidential.

They have always been able to play around with this restriction.

"Of course, Shaogang's crude steel production is limited, and our Nangang Gas production capacity is not enough to meet the various inert gases needed by the entire China semiconductor industry chain."

"So we plan to sell part of the primary concentrator to manufacturers such as Baosteel, Anshan Iron and Steel, Wuhan Iron and Steel, and Shougang, and then purchase crude products from them."

"In the end, Shaogang Gas will further process it into qualified electronic special gas, making Shaogang Gas the largest electronic special gas manufacturer in China and even the world."

Xie Lingyun added his thoughts on the side.

The scale of Nanshan Special Steel is not very large, but the scale of China's steel industry is the largest in the world.

No country can threaten this number one.

With this foundation in place, it means that the production cost of some inert gases in China will be much lower than that in other countries.

When the time comes, Shaogang Gas will be able to take advantage of the price war to bring down all the major electronic and special gas manufacturers in the world.

In a few years, Shaogang Gas will be able to live a life close to a monopoly.

At that time, it will be Shaogang's turn to choke others' necks.

"This idea of ​​yours is very good and totally worthy of heavy investment and promotion."

“Even in order to prevent Baosteel and Shougang manufacturers from exporting crude gas overseas, we can also consider promoting the introduction of relevant policies to restrict the export of primary gas products.”

"Or let these companies use their own gas companies as capital to integrate them into Shaogang Gas to form a manufacturer specializing in the production of various inert gases and other electronic special gases."

Electronic specialty gases are widely used in various processes such as semiconductor chip and liquid crystal panel material manufacturing, such as cleaning, deposition, photolithography, etching, ion implantation, film formation, doping, etc.

Electronic specialty gases have the characteristics of high technology and high added value. They are essential basic and supporting raw materials in the production of electronic industries such as semiconductors, liquid crystal display panels, photovoltaics, and LEDs.

According to statistics from relevant agencies, semiconductors account for 73.1% of the global electronic specialty gas downstream application market, display panels account for 19.4%, compound semiconductors/LEDs account for 4.4%, and photovoltaics account for 3.1%.

Cao Yang naturally attached great importance to such an important thing.

So even if you give up some of your shares, it's still worth it.

After all, monopoly business is the most profitable.

"Electronic special gas is the second largest raw material after silicon wafers in the wafer manufacturing process, and it runs through the main process of wafer manufacturing."

"Silicon wafers account for approximately 32.9% of wafer manufacturing raw materials, followed by electronic special gases which account for 14.1%."

"Electronic special gas is a large-volume consumable that runs through the entire process of the wafer manufacturing process."

“In the entire process of wafer manufacturing, up to 100 kinds of electronic gases are used, and the core section involves about 40-50 kinds of special electronic gases, which run through film formation, cleaning, deposition, etching, doping, and ionization. Injection and other processes, the electronic gas is also called the 'food' of the wafer."

"Such an important raw material is completely worthy of Shaogang Special Gas and Nanshan Equipment's heavy investment in related resources for development."

Zhang Jing also came with us today to participate in this visit.

There are too many companies in the Nanshan system, and it is impossible for every factory's foundation laying ceremony or production launch ceremony to be held in a hurry. In that case, Cao Yang would not have that much time to attend.

This time, the scale of the first phase of Shaogang Gas Project is not particularly large. It mainly focuses on the treatment of the exhaust gas produced by Shaogang itself.

In the future, we will consider using crude gas from other manufacturers such as Baosteel.

Therefore, Zhang Jing naturally hopes that Xie Lingyun and Pan Jinxing can allocate more manpower and material resources to develop the field of electronic special energy.

After all, the semiconductor industry is the largest consumer of electronic gas.

Nanshan Semiconductor is the largest semiconductor company in China.

"The production process of these electronic special gases should be relatively complicated, right?"

"Academician Pan, you should worry more about the equipment."

Cao Yang definitely supports Zhang Jing's point of view.

Xie Lingyun must also hope that Shaogang Gas can develop and grow, so that the influence of Nanshan Special Steel will be greater.

However, this requires Nanshan Equipment to develop more types of related equipment.

"The difference between electronic specialty gases and traditional industrial gases is that they have higher purity or have special uses, such as participating in chemical reactions."

"As a result, the requirements for production equipment will be much higher, which is why most of the electronic special gases used in the domestic semiconductor industry had to be imported."

"We have to research and produce these equipment, and we can naturally produce them."

"However, I think we can still selectively target some gases. Otherwise, if we produce all the gases ourselves, the price/performance ratio may not be higher."

"There are some relatively mature gases and equipment for producing these gases, and other manufacturers can also handle them."

Pan Jinxing understands everyone’s needs.

But he didn't want to take over all these jobs.

After all, some markets are very small. If there are already other good domestic manufacturers playing in them, there is no need for Nanshan Equipment to join in the fun.

Zhang Jing basically agreed with Pan Jinxing's statement.

“Usually, the purity requirement of electronic special gas must reach 5N and above, and N represents the number of 9 in the purity percentage.”

"Wafer manufacturing has stricter requirements on the purity of electronic special gases, generally greater than 6N."

"For example, the purity of silane special gas in the deposition and film forming section of the wafer manufacturing process requires 8N and above."

"In addition, the proportion accuracy is a core parameter for mixed gases, that is, precise control of the mixing proportions of different gases. In the industry, component proportions are generally expressed in ppm, ppb, ppt and percentage."

"If the impurity content is too high, at least it will cause the quality of the relevant downstream batches to not meet the standard, or at worst, it will spread and contaminate the entire production line, causing high losses."

“The more advanced the production line, the higher the quality requirements for electronic special gases.”

"At present, our Nanshan Semiconductor's chip manufacturing process has developed from the past 60nm and 28nm to the current advanced 14nm. Correspondingly, the volume of polluting particles in the electronic gas must be reduced many times to ensure that the wafer is not polluted and the output products are maintained. Yield rate.”

"In this case, it is also possible to produce high-end electronic specialties in a targeted manner and leave the mid- to low-end market to other domestic manufacturers."

There are so many electronic special gases that the semiconductor industry needs to use, and not all gases can be handled by Chinese manufacturers.

Therefore, Zhang Jing also supports Pan Jinxing's idea. There is no need for Shaogang Gas to produce everything.

That is not in Nanshan Semiconductor's interests.

For example, companies such as Walter Gas, Jinhong Gas, and Kaimei Gas in the industry are producing high-purity carbon tetrafluoride, high-purity hexafluoroethane, high-purity carbon dioxide, high-purity carbon monoxide, high-purity ammonia, and high-purity nitric oxide. Among many other products, it has done very well and can realize import substitution.

At this time, there is naturally no need to engage in Shaogang Gas.

Areas that are relatively weak in China, such as helium and neon, are where Shaogang Gases is most worthy of its efforts.

"Then we will work hard in this direction and promote the rapid development of Shaogang Gas as soon as possible."

With Cao Yang's decision, Shaogang Gas has officially entered the fast lane of development.

The first batch of electronic special gases they produced also began to be officially used in some factories of Nanshan Semiconductor.

Naturally, it was impossible to keep this news secret forever.

Especially when Nanshan Special Steel officially announced that Shaogang Gas, a subsidiary of Nanshan Special Steel Company, would officially enter the electronic special gas market, some related companies immediately noticed this change.

"Pat, the brother company of Nanshan Semiconductor in China has started producing neon and helium. Have you seen the news?"

Otellini called Pat to his office early in the morning.

As the world's largest chip company, Intel is now wary of Nanshan Semiconductor.

There is no way, Intel used to lead the industry in chip manufacturing, but now it is about to be surpassed by Nanshan Semiconductor.

They definitely cannot accept this result.

So last year, Intel was very active in promoting photoresist-related solutions, wanting to encircle Nanshan Semiconductor, limit its development speed, and even directly kill Nanshan Semiconductor.

However, this plan quickly failed.

During this time, people from Intel, Apple, ASML and other companies are thinking of new, better and more comprehensive solutions to deal with Nanshan Semiconductor.

Inert gases such as neon and helium are an area that Otellini and the others have selected to prepare for action.

Although the industry concentration of these inert gases is not as high as that of photoresist, Nanshan Group's companies have no previous production experience in this area, and even if they want to make breakthroughs, they are not so fast.

Who would have thought that the general direction had just been thought out, but the plan had not even begun to be implemented, and it was about to be aborted.

After knowing that Shaogang Gas has begun to produce electronic special gases such as neon and helium, relevant electronic special gas manufacturers around the world definitely do not want to force others to expand production scale.

Normally, what the global electronics and special gas giants need to do at this time is to lower the prices of related gases and stifle the development of new companies through low-cost dumping.

As for cutting off the confession, you are digging your own grave.

Especially if there is a case of photoresist in the front, not many electronic specialty gas manufacturers are willing to cooperate.

"I just listened to the report from the people below."

Pat was not in a good mood either.

During this period, he was also forced to work overtime every day to lead everyone to break through the 14-nanometer chip processing technology as quickly as possible.

Although Americans work harder than those in Europe, it is definitely very rare to work overtime every day.

After all, the degree of involution of chip companies like Intel cannot be compared with Internet companies in Silicon Valley, let alone companies in China.

"Do you think it is necessary to continue implementing the plan we originally discussed?"

Otellini asked further.

Pat struggled for a while and said: "I think maybe even if we want to continue to implement it, suppliers such as Air Chemicals, Deutsche Linde, Air Liquide and Japan Solar may not be willing to actively cooperate. "

"In addition, our plan is not perfect. Nanshan Semiconductor can also import some related gases from Polar Bear and Central Europe."

"So I suggest that we should not deal with Nanshan Semiconductor from the direction of encirclement and suppression."

Hearing what Pat said, Otellini was a little unhappy, "If we don't encircle Nanshan Semiconductor, will we just watch them grow and develop?"

Now that he has expressed his opinion, Pat naturally needs to have something to say at this time.

Otherwise he knew that Otellini would not let him go.

"Otellini, in the past many years, we have never had any direct contact with Nanshan Semiconductor."

"I think although we are competitors, we are not unable to cooperate."

"There are currently relatively few computer chip manufacturers. It is not unacceptable for everyone to divide the market or form a certain price agreement."

"Otherwise, if we continue to compete blindly, no one will make any money by then."

Pat doesn’t want to get involved in chip technology with Nanshan Semiconductor.

The original research and development progress is fine, so why do we have to speed it up at every turn?

For Pat, Nanshan Semiconductor already has the strength to sit down and discuss with Intel.

It is better for everyone to make money after consensus, rather than vicious competition.