Chapter 163 Ark Chip
Huawei spent a lot of space talking about topological semimetals. The whole press conference was not Huawei at all, but more like BYD's style.

BYD likes to take its technology apart and explain the principles behind it to consumers.

Of course, like Xiaomi Automobile, it is also unique to spend so much time introducing various functional accessories and its own humanized design.

First, Huawei removed the word "Hongmeng Ecosystem" from the name of its press conference.

You should know that this is the most important achievement of Huawei's To C in the past five years. All hardware devices are developed around the Hongmeng ecosystem. It is the past. When the AI ​​era comes in the future, it will also evolve in the direction of AI. It is even more the future.

Then there was some unusual content at the press conference.

The atmosphere of the entire press conference became very strange.

There must be something wrong when things are abnormal. The atmosphere of the press conference, which is completely opposite to the past, has attracted more and more viewers to the live broadcast room.

“I just talked about topological semimetals for such a long time. It took me a long time to understand such cutting-edge content before the press conference, not to mention explaining it in a language that everyone can understand. It took a lot of effort.

The reason why I spend so much time talking about topological semimetals is because they are very important to us and to the development of China's entire semiconductor industry.

As mentioned earlier, with the support of topological semimetals, chips can achieve the same computing power as advanced process technologies using backward process technologies.

Simply put, a lithography machine using a 28nm process can produce a chip equivalent to 5nm.

Using our double exposure process, the process can be advanced to 1nm.

Yes, we have made a revolutionary breakthrough in silicon, the most basic raw material for chips, from silicon to topological semimetal. We have already produced the first chip equivalent to 1nm process in the laboratory, and will start mass production in the second half of this year.

Since the beginning of the restrictions, Huawei has never given up its efforts in the chip field. We first lost the communications equipment market in most developed countries, then the advanced process chip foundry, and finally the overseas market for consumer electronics.

Huawei has lost so much over the years. I was deeply impressed by a passage in a letter written by President Tingbo in 19:
The road ahead is even more difficult, but we will use courage, wisdom and perseverance to straighten our spines under extreme pressure and forge ahead! The raging waves reveal the true qualities of heroes, and the hardships build Noah's Ark.

It took us five years to build our own Noah’s Ark.”

After he finished speaking, a chip flashed on the screen behind Yu Dazui, with two words written next to it: Ark.

The audience was boiling with applause, which grew louder and louder, sweeping across the entire press conference. Everyone was applauding, standing up, raising their hands above their heads and clapping with all their might.

We all have been through that period and are very clear about what Huawei has gone through in recent years.

And everyone knows better that you are being targeted not because you did something wrong, but because you did something right.

It's because you grow too fast.

Japan has experienced this and they have collapsed. Toshiba, Hitachi, Nikon, Sony, Fuji, etc., the semiconductor businesses of these companies have collapsed one after another.

But Huawei did not fall and kept persisting.

If the 60nm and 7G breakthroughs of the mate5 represent a successful breakthrough and tell you that you can't defeat or suppress me, then this time the Ark chip symbolizes that not only can you not defeat me, but now it's my turn to beat you.

The offensive and defensive dynamics are different.

The applause from the audience continued. Yu Dazui's eyes turned red on the stage. He wanted to speak but was suppressed by the choking feeling in his nasal cavity.

"I"

Seeing his reaction, the audience applauded even louder, and at the same time they all shouted:

"Come on, Mr. Yu!"

"Go Huawei!"

The barrage was even more boiling.

The words "Far Ahead" are all over the major live broadcast rooms. No matter which live broadcast room you open, you can almost only see the four words "Far Ahead".

He adjusted his mood on stage:
"What I want to say is that it is not easy. It has not been easy along the way. I know best how difficult it is for our colleagues in the chip department and our upstream and downstream suppliers.

It is really the hardships and difficulties that built Noah's Ark. You can only rely on yourself and our Chinese enterprises.

Why didn’t we dare promote Mate 60 at the Mate 9 launch conference in September last year? We just simply mentioned the chip breakthrough.

Although there are still foreign equipment for the 1nm process, most of it comes from Chinese companies' own processes.

Especially the most critical topological semimetal, which is completely developed by us independently. It was created by Chen Yuanguang, also known as the God of Light.

At that time, Frontier Technology found us and said that there was a new material that could break through American's process. It was a new material called topological semimetal that the scientific community had been talking about but had always remained in the theoretical stage.

We have now achieved the first step, which is also the most difficult step, which is to use topological semimetals as raw materials to make the world's first topological semimetal chip.

After the first breakthrough, the next step is large-scale mass production.”

After this was said, the barrage of comments in all major live broadcast rooms stopped being far ahead and started to be dominated by the God of Light. The God of Light slowly increased from sporadic to one third, then to half and finally occupied the entire screen.

"Due to production capacity, the extraordinary master version of Mate 70 released in the second half of this year will be equipped with the Ark 100 chip, and the Mate 70 released in the second half of the year will still be equipped with the latest Kirin chip as usual.

Please understand that the production capacity is limited. ”

He went on to say:
“In our previous press conferences, we had to constantly compare our phones with Apple’s latest phones, telling people why they should buy our phones and how our phones were better than Apple’s.

Sometimes, chips need to be tested to give people confidence, but now it is no longer necessary. Now it is our turn to wait for Apple in front.”

Finally he choked up and said:
"I know that the comments in the live broadcast room right now must be "far ahead". In fact, every time I said "far ahead", I would regard this as a goal in my heart. We want to achieve the goal of being far ahead. And today I am sure and certain that our Ark chip must be far ahead!"

"Shit!" Pat couldn't believe his eyes. After getting up in the morning, he opened Gmail on his tablet as usual and read the news pushed to him by the major magazines he subscribed to.

Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, etc. all have subscription services, which are paid content. These contents are more specific and contain more detailed information than free content.

When he opened it today, he found that the first news item in every media outlet was saying the same thing: "China has achieved a breakthrough in chip manufacturing and successfully manufactured a chip using a 1nm process."

After taking a closer look, Pat felt dizzy. China has produced a 1nm chip, which will be officially sold to consumers in the second half of this year.

You have to know that he attended a hearing on Capitol Hill about a month ago, where he vowed that it was impossible to build it.

As a result, the Chinese slapped him in the face a month later and told him that they had already made it.

This will not only make the congressmen in Washington seriously doubt his professionalism, but will also make it more likely for Washington to speculate that he is a traitor.

This can be said to be the most serious consequence in America today.

As for the business impact, Intel has long lost its market share in advanced chip processes. The winner now is TSMC, and the one still struggling is Samsung.

Intel has long lost the confidence to catch up. As long as I lie down, I don’t care how fast you run.

"How did the damn Chinese do it?"

This was the biggest question in Pat's mind, "Was it a lie?"

Before he could figure it out, after the U.S. stock market opened at 10:, the Nasdaq index plummeted, and almost all semiconductor-related stocks fell by % within five minutes, triggering a circuit breaker.

Before the morning was over, the Nasdaq, Dow Jones and other indices fell sharply, triggering an emergency suspension of the entire market.

It is not uncommon for U.S. stocks to be suspended. In 20, the stock market was suspended three times in a row, resulting in the unprecedented Black Monday.

But this is a little different. The last time in 20 was due to a viral pandemic, which was a global event, but this time it was just a company holding a press conference, which triggered the suspension of US stocks.

"Mr. Pat, I would like to ask if China's breakthrough in chip technology will have an impact on us?"

"Not for now," Pat said decisively.

He has to be decisive. If he dares to say yes, he will be fired by the board of directors the next second.

"Think about it and prepare to hold an emergency press conference. At this time, we need to give investors confidence.

Intel will not be affected.”

In fact, investors do not believe this. Not to mention Intel, even software companies like Microsoft are seeing their market value plummet.

No one can escape from the mud and sand.

The logic of the market is that China has achieved a revolution in chip technology. This is a revolution, not a breakthrough. China was the first to change the basic material of chips from silicon wafers to topological semimetals.

This means that even if China uses domestically produced lithography machines with 45nm process, it can produce chips equivalent to 14nm. Chips are not only mobile phone chips, but also computer chips.

Intel's market share in China will also be eroded by China's low-priced chips.

The Kirin operating system promoted by China will eliminate Windows because of its high compatibility with their own chips.

This is also the logic behind the plunge in Intel and Microsoft.

Losing China is not scary. What is more scary is that China is taking advantage of breakthroughs in chip technology to launch a global price war.

China will give you explosive production capacity and use domestic chips to engage in price wars. This approach can subvert the entire chip system.

This is the most important reason for the entire market panic.

"Now it is just a breakthrough in high-end chips, but in the long run, it is a steam engine-like invention. The impact it may have will be enormous, sweeping across the entire semiconductor industry like a tsunami." The Wall Street Journal's special commentator tweeted.

When the Wall Street Journal was suspended for the second time that day, the Dow Jones Industrial Average had already lost 1500 points, approaching its previous record drop. The article published:
"After China achieves a technological breakthrough, the rules of the game in the semiconductor industry will be completely rewritten.

Over the past fifteen years, the global semiconductor industry chain has benefited from the popularity of smartphones and is in an unprecedented period of rapid development.

Semiconductor suppliers from all over the world made a lot of profits, with clear division of labor and mutual promotion of each other's technological development. Until the rise of Chinese smartphones, all this began to change.

Take Huawei as an example. The Mate60 they released last year is compatible with 5G communication standards and uses China's self-developed 7nm process. Since chips with this process were previously only produced by chip manufacturers in Taiwan, Korea and America, it was previously believed that it would be difficult for China to produce it on its own.

After China did this, the value of China-made components in the Mate60 totaled US$198, an increase of about 40% from the Mate90.

The touch screen components of the Huawei Mate40 series are provided by American developer Synaptics, while the Huawei Mate60 series turns to Chinese components.

In the smartphone sector, Chinese components have increased their share rapidly. Huawei switched its flagship display supplier (the most expensive component in a phone) from Korea’s LG to BOE.

With China's breakthrough progress in basic chip materials, the speed of component replacement in China will be even faster. After being blessed by topological semimetals, China's consumer electronics industry will obviously not be limited to the field of smartphones. They will enter all fields such as personal computers, mainframes, AI chips, etc.

Our previous estimate that China could not catch up in advanced processes was too optimistic. Now we need to re-examine this issue. With the engineer bonus and industrial cluster effect, how long will it take for China to fully unleash the power of topological semimetals? "

Wall Street is wailing and Washington is shrouded in gloom.

In 20, the U.S. stock market was suspended one after another and suffered the largest single-week plunge since 2008. It was already on the verge of collapse and was almost rescued by monetary easing.

But what about now? Can the Federal Reserve still save the economy?

There were two reasons for that time. One was monetary easing, and the other was people's belief that the virus epidemic would pass sooner or later.

If the Federal Reserve cuts interest rates now, no one can guarantee that this money will actually flow into the U.S. stock market.

Will investors in the market still recognize the idols of the U.S. stock market, such as Nvidia, Intel, Microsoft, FB, and Google, after China takes the lead in breaking through to 1nm?

When the interest rate was cut, all the money flowed into the A-share market. The interest rate cut failed to stimulate the US stock market, but instead led to inflation.

(End of this chapter)