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Trump boosts China's chip industry like Xi Jinping never could

djaque 6y ago
In a related note: I've seen a huge surge in good quality original products that were engineered in China, manufactured in China, and then sold by China. Take Rigol and Miniware for instance. They have the hobbyist electronic market captured and their gear is also used professionally. They have found the powerful combination of cheap and pretty good quality. They are full Chinese companies and I haven't seen anyone match them yet. I'm trying to find and am not having luck, but I swear that Scotty from the youtube channel Strange Parts had an excellent interview with Rigol about this.
- garaetjjte 6y ago
  Eh, value-for-money is great, hardware is fine, but software is usually crap.
hajile 6y ago
Very disingenuous title. First, China was already trying to move toward manufacturing independence. Second, instead of buying 5nm chips, China is settling for working on initial 14nm production. That's 8 YEARS old at this point (not even comparable to Intel's 14++++ stack). Third, this also seemed to be on the back of equipment purchased earlier. Moving forward, they can't buy cutting-edge manufacturing devices. Instead, they have to create a whole industry to make the machines to make advanced chip fabs. I somehow doubt that the normal, rather loose Chinese tolerances are up for the job. Fourth, they also need to build out an entire silicon refinery industry which is itself not an easy task to be accomplished within the next few years. By the time all this is in place, the economic repercussions will have been extreme. If Biden wins the election, he's going to continue the same process, but I somehow doubt this same outlet will continue pumping out such dumb partisan pieces.
- throwaway4good 6y ago
  True. The goal of an independent semi-conductor industry has been a goal for the Chinese government in at least a decade. The problem is: How do you convince a world class chip designer like HiSilicon that it should use a local foundry rather than TSMC? TSMC which is more advanced, more reliable, maybe even cheaper? Without breaking China's commitment to WTO and other agreements that facilitate open trade. That problem is solved now by the policies of the US. And not only for Huawei. Here is for example SMIC announcement of an improved "FinFET N+1" process explicitly without US technology: https://cntechpost.com/2020/10/12/smic-achieves-breakthrough-in-7nm-process/ https://cntechpost.com/2020/10/12/smic-achieves-breakthrough...

In a related note: I've seen a huge surge in good quality original products that were engineered in China, manufactured in China, and then sold by China. Take Rigol and Miniware for instance. They have the hobbyist electronic market captured and their gear is also used professionally. They have found the powerful combination of cheap and pretty good quality. They are full Chinese companies and I haven't seen anyone match them yet. I'm trying to find and am not having luck, but I swear that Scotty from the youtube channel Strange Parts had an excellent interview with Rigol about this.

garaetjjte 6y ago
Eh, value-for-money is great, hardware is fine, but software is usually crap.

hajile 6y ago

Very disingenuous title. First, China was already trying to move toward manufacturing independence. Second, instead of buying 5nm chips, China is settling for working on initial 14nm production. That's 8 YEARS old at this point (not even comparable to Intel's 14++++ stack). Third, this also seemed to be on the back of equipment purchased earlier. Moving forward, they can't buy cutting-edge manufacturing devices. Instead, they have to create a whole industry to make the machines to make advanced chip fabs. I somehow doubt that the normal, rather loose Chinese tolerances are up for the job. Fourth, they also need to build out an entire silicon refinery industry which is itself not an easy task to be accomplished within the next few years. By the time all this is in place, the economic repercussions will have been extreme. If Biden wins the election, he's going to continue the same process, but I somehow doubt this same outlet will continue pumping out such dumb partisan pieces.

throwaway4good 6y ago
True. The goal of an independent semi-conductor industry has been a goal for the Chinese government in at least a decade. The problem is: How do you convince a world class chip designer like HiSilicon that it should use a local foundry rather than TSMC? TSMC which is more advanced, more reliable, maybe even cheaper? Without breaking China's commitment to WTO and other agreements that facilitate open trade. That problem is solved now by the policies of the US. And not only for Huawei. Here is for example SMIC announcement of an improved "FinFET N+1" process explicitly without US technology: https://cntechpost.com/2020/10/12/smic-achieves-breakthrough-in-7nm-process/ https://cntechpost.com/2020/10/12/smic-achieves-breakthrough...