Visit to Shanghai Silicon Wafer Factory: There are indeed a lot of recruits, but 202 1 will continue to be out of stock.

Shanghai Xinsheng Semiconductor Technology Co., Ltd. Tuyuan /IT Age

Read quickly in 30 seconds.

1, the wafer production capacity is incredibly tight, and the downstream crazy "hoarding" has reached a panic level. Although domestic large-scale silicon wafer projects have been launched one after another, they are still rational. In a nutshell, they don't want to be pigs on the tuyere.

After the autumn harvest, there is only one row of rice stubble left in the rice field; On the east and west sides of a large piece of golden yellow, there are two large factories, Shanghai Tesla Super Factory in the west and Shanghai Xinsheng Semiconductor Technology Co., Ltd. in the east.

In the southernmost port area of Shanghai, the human civilization is higher and higher; Paddy fields, factories, chips, where the three waves of human civilization meet.

Just like rice provides food for human beings, silicon wafer is the "basic food" of semiconductor and chip industry-the key raw material, which is usually used as the substrate to process various device structures and leads, thus realizing the manufacture of semiconductor products such as integrated circuits and discrete devices.

Figure source /IT era

Since the second half of this year, the wafer foundry capacity has been extremely scarce. For chip design and manufacturing companies, just like bread without flour, it is difficult for a clever woman to cook without rice. As a result, the industry's attitude towards production capacity is generally unstable, the cost of wafer foundry continues to rise and is transmitted downwards, and many chips are out of stock and prices rise. After all, paper can't contain fire, and the shortage of automobile chips some time ago has caused heated discussion.

Quickly launch projects, expand production capacity, and stand on the cusp of strong demand for wafer foundry? The industry's answer to this is: no! The investment in silicon wafer industry is huge, and the risks and benefits are highly cyclical and uncontrollable. Some analysts pointed out that despite the strong demand in the downstream market, silicon wafer factories such as Shanghai Xinsheng and Shanghai Chaosi have suffered losses due to overcapacity, so they will not easily expand production. China Silicon Wafer Factory is unwilling to be a "pig on the cusp", and "long-term orders may not necessarily increase in price, but short-term orders are expected to increase".

"I saw a van pulling a car the other day." A newly promoted front-line employee in Shanghai said that he had never seen the company recruit so many people, which left a deep impression on him.

Figure source /IT era

Another employee of Xinsheng production line confirmed to the IT Times reporter that Xinsheng was in the second phase of production at that time, and the manpower was really tight. At present, the 300 mm silicon wafer produced by this factory is in short supply. TSMC, Grofonder, SMIC and Hua Hong Li Hong are all its customers, and the market share of freshmen in China is about 65,438+00%. "The second phase has just started and is in the production stage, and there is a large shortage of manpower. We give priority to the domestic market. Now the monthly output of 300mm is more than 100 thousand pieces, and the most expensive piece is about 200,300 dollars. " The above-mentioned employees said that compared with foreign competing products, the newly added products still have price advantages. Although the equipment and materials are all from abroad, the comprehensive costs such as labor costs are still very competitive.

A newly promoted employee in charge of equipment revealed that "there are more equipment in the factory than people, and a large number of people are being recruited to supplement the shortage of manpower." On the recruitment website, the IT Times reporter saw that in June 5438+February, Shanghai Xinsheng released a large number of recruitment positions, involving product engineers, polishing equipment engineers and technicians.

Source/recruitment website

A senior Shanghai freshman told the IT Times reporter: "According to the original plan, we have been expanding the production capacity, from 6,543.8+0.5 million tablets to 300,000 tablets per month, and now it has been expanded to 200,000 tablets." In other words, the expansion of new output is actually not caused by the insufficient production capacity of the wafer foundry during this period. The senior official also pointed out: "Capacity building needs a cycle. Today, the downstream demand is strong, and the upstream can't help. When the expansion is completed, there is no demand downstream. Therefore, strategic forecasting is needed. "

At present, the global silicon wafer market is mainly occupied by overseas manufacturers and manufacturers in Taiwan Province Province of China, with a high market concentration. According to the data of SEMI, in 20 18, the combined market share of Shinetsu Chemical of Japan, SUMCO of Japan, Universal Wafer of Taiwan Province Province of China, Siltronic of Germany and SKSiltron of South Korea exceeded 90%.

Yuanyuan/Guoyuan Securities

In order to make up the supply gap of silicon wafers (especially large silicon wafers) and reduce dependence on imports, China is actively moving towards the manufacture of 8-inch and 12-inch large silicon wafers, and a number of major investments have been launched. Shanghai Xinsheng, Chongqing Super Silicon, Tianjin Zhonghuan and Ningxia Silver all locked in large-size silicon wafer projects.

According to public information, as the first undertaker of the national 300mm large silicon wafer project, Shanghai Xinsheng broke ground in July 20 15, and achieved the sales of baffle, accompanying wafer, test wafer and other products in 20 17. According to the original plan, the project plans to invest in the construction of a production line with an annual output of 600,000 300mm silicon wafers, which are 6.5438+0.5 million wafers in Phase I, 6.5438+0.5 million wafers in Phase II and 300,000 wafers in Phase III respectively.

Figure source /IT era

In addition to Shanghai Xinsheng, there is another large-scale silicon wafer factory in Shanghai-Shanghai Super Silicon Semiconductor, which was established in 2008 and officially put into production on 20 10. Chongqing Super Silicon Semiconductor and Chengdu Super Silicon Semiconductor belong to Super Silicon (AST), and all three companies are committed to the R&D and production of large silicon wafers for integrated circuits. On April 20 16, the first phase of Chongqing super-silicon large silicon wafer project was put into trial production, and it was officially completed in June 438+00, and the product off-line ceremony was held. After commissioning, the annual production capacity of 8-inch silicon wafers and 12-inch silicon wafers will be 6 million and 600,000 respectively.

Shanghai super silicon project includes AST comprehensive research institute, 300mm automatic intelligent production line, 450mm pilot production line, advanced equipment R&D center and artificial crystal R&D center. On 20 18, the Shanghai Super Silicon 300mm automatic intelligent production line project started construction. According to the plan, after the completion of the project, the annual production capacity of 3.6 million 300mm polishing wafers and epitaxial wafers and the production capacity of 6.5438+0.2 million 450mm polishing wafers will be formed.

The IT Times reporter learned from relevant departments that Shanghai Super Silicon was officially put into production on September 28th this year. The monthly production capacity of 300mm polishing wafers is about 50,000 wafers and 20,000 wafers, and the average price of each wafer exceeds 100 USD.

12 10, Global Wafer announced its agreement to acquire German silicon wafer manufacturer SiltronicAG for 3.75 billion euros. After the merger, Universal Wafer is expected to become the largest silicon wafer manufacturer in the world.

Global wafer map source/network

The silicon wafer industry has a typical cyclical nature. With the fluctuation of the downstream semiconductor cycle, the price changes slightly lag behind the market scale changes. The biggest blow to the industry came from the financial crisis in 2008. Before the global crisis broke out, the market demand for 300mm wafers was extremely optimistic. Shinetsu, SUMCO and other big companies have made radical plans to expand production. As a result, due to the impact of the economic crisis, with the high inventory of silicon wafers and the sharp decline in smartphone sales, the global semiconductor market has fallen sharply and productivity growth has been sluggish.

A research report of Guoyuan Securities pointed out that the industry is currently in a new round of silicon wafer boom cycle. With the launch of 5G mobile phone in 20 19, the price per unit area of silicon chip rose to 0.94 USD. With the rapid development of emerging application markets such as new energy vehicles, the price of silicon wafers will continue to rise and remain high in the future due to the relationship between supply and demand.

Yuanyuan/Guoyuan Securities

Zhang Guobin, CEO of Electronic Innovation Network, said that Japanese silicon wafer manufacturers such as Shinetsu, SUMCO and Shanghai Xinsheng have already experienced overcapacity, so they dare not expand production easily. However, the strong demand in the downstream market is still good for these companies. "General long-term orders may not necessarily rise, but short-term orders are expected to rise."

04

The production capacity has been scheduled for the first quarter of next year.

"At present, the wafer production capacity has reached an incredible level, and the customer's demand for production capacity has reached a panic level. It is estimated that from the second half of next year to the second half of 2022, the logic and DRAM markets will be out of stock to an unimaginable extent. " 165438+1On October 30th, Huang Chongren, chairman of the chip foundry, pointed out the current situation of tight wafer production capacity.

Image source /Pixabay

In this regard, Gu Wenjun, chief analyst of Xinmou Research, also revealed that the mature technology of 8-inch and 12-inch is still very strict, not only at the manufacturing level, but also in packaging testing. Now the list is in the first quarter of next year.

From the perspective of terminal products, Joan, an analyst at Jibang Consulting, said: "At present, the most scarce are power management IC and panel driver IC." From the demand side, the downstream demand of 8-inch wafer mainly comes from power management chip (PMIC), CMOS image sensor chip, fingerprint identification chip, display driver IC and power device, which are widely used in smart phones, tablet computers, televisions, PCs, electric vehicles and other fields.

According to SMIC's Q3 financial report this year, the mature technologies of 55/65nm and 40/45nm are still the main sources of the company's profits, and the revenue of 14/28nm only accounts for 14.6% of SMIC. The production capacity of mature technology is in short supply, and the products of UMC and other enterprises are in short supply. Take UMC's share price as an example. Since the beginning of 2020, the increase has exceeded 200%. SMIC also said in the third quarterly report: "The demand for mature application platforms is as strong as ever, and the income of power management, RF signal processing, fingerprint identification and image signal processing has increased substantially."

Source /SMIC 2020 Third Quarter Financial Report

05

Chip or "dystocia" or price increase

Compared with IDM (vertical integrated manufacturing) mode chip factory and Foundry mode chip foundry with manufacturing capability, chip design companies will face the challenge of not getting the production capacity of fabs, which is undoubtedly a blow to the capital of new chip industry. "The most direct impact is that many designed chips cannot be mass-produced, resulting in a decline in investment income, which indirectly leads to an increase in chip prices, an increase in system product costs, and a decrease in gross profit, which affects future R&D and innovation." Zhang Guobin said.

65438+February 2 1, a letter about the price increase of ST (stmicroelectronics Company) was widely circulated in the circle of friends: "Due to the COVID-19 epidemic, the supply of raw materials for ST is in short supply, and at the same time it faces rising costs and aggressive commercial terms. In view of this, ST decided to raise the prices of all product lines from 202 1 1. " In addition, Renesas, NXP and other semiconductor manufacturers have also issued price increase letters.

ST (stmicroelectronics Company) Price Increase Letter Source/Network

According to media reports, Sunmoon, a packaging manufacturer, also led the price increase of semiconductor packaging, starting from next year1October 65438+, with an increase range of 3-5%. In addition, Zhang Guobin believes that the Sino-US trade friction and the turmoil caused by the epidemic have caused the "hoarding" sentiment of downstream manufacturers, and he predicts that the tight production capacity environment may not be alleviated until the second half of next year.

Author /IT Times reporter Li Yuyang

Editor/Kicker

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Figure /it time to report to the country source securities Pixabay network

Source /IT Times WeChat official account vittimes