Chapter 166 What is a photolithography machine? This is a metal burner

The person who just spoke was Nikon's senior vice president Decheng Jieliang. His mention of America made the atmosphere in the entire conference room suddenly become solemn.

Joseph's death is just around the corner. Many Japanese media have reported his death, and the Japanese Internet has linked this incident to the European Space Agency's close relationship with Light Armor Aerospace.

Everyone here has heard about this. If you dare to cooperate with China, you must be prepared to accept retaliation.

But when the opportunity appears in front of them, no one is willing to give up.

The Chinese have clearly come up with a brand new system that has huge potential and can help Nikon realize its long-cherished wish of returning to the top. The Nikon executives present are unwilling to give up at all costs.

"America didn't say it couldn't cooperate with China. America can curb Nikon's development and deliberately cultivate ASML to surpass Nikon. Does Nikon have to wait to die?" Morita's tone was full of anger.

He had been working at Nikon before becoming the general manager of Nikon's semiconductor business unit, and had been working for Nikon's lithography business for nearly thirty years.

As a veteran who has experienced glory and is now at an unprecedented low, Morita is well aware that ASML's ability to overtake Nikon and TSMC's private cooperation with ASML to overtake by immersion are nothing but business stories created by the media.

In fact, this was entirely an offensive launched against Japanese companies by the upstream and downstream companies of the entire American semiconductor industry chain under the leadership of the American Department of Energy.

Because most of the basic research on the most advanced EUV, or deep ultraviolet lithography machine, is completed under the leadership of the American Department of Energy.

As for Intel, TSMC, Texas Instruments, and Samsung, the former chip manufacturers all switched to ASML overnight, leaving Nikon no chance at all. Morita simply refused to believe that there was no national will behind this.

"We are now forced to make 250nm lithography machines. I couldn't sleep in my bedroom the night I made this decision. I thought for a long time how Nikon could have fallen to this point.

When I went to attend the semiconductor exhibition, ASML was introducing how they had made breakthroughs in advanced processes and how they were moving towards 1nm, and they were so proud of their own products that I really couldn't say that our new product this year is a 250nm i-line lithography machine.

This is a shame for Nikon, but now there is an opportunity to overtake, and I don't want to give it up at all costs."

Although Morita claimed in an interview that the purpose was to achieve differentiated competition from his competitors, in fact he was forced to do no other than to do marginal business that others looked down upon.

"This is our only advantage over ASML. Washington is keeping an eye on ASML. They want to force ASML to move to America, but we have lagged behind in the field of lithography for many years.

They won't notice that we are cooperating with China.

Besides, who said this is a lithography machine? A lithography machine is a device for silicon wafers. Now it is topological semimetal. This is a brand new chip manufacturing equipment. We should not call it a lithography machine.

I think Metal Burner is a good name.

We can establish a new company through layers of penetration to cooperate with China. We ourselves have many shell companies in Brazil, so we can do more penetration.

Besides, Washington has not said that we cannot conduct joint research and development with China. Their restrictions are not that restrictive.

If it is discovered in the future and someone has to sacrifice, I am willing to make the sacrifice for the future of Nikon. You can put all the responsibility for making decisions on me.

Please, even if I can't see it, I hope that one day Nikon can surpass ASML and return to the top spot in lithography equipment." After saying this, Morita stood up and walked to the middle of the conference room to bow to his colleagues.

The Nikon executives present had worked at Nikon for at least fifteen years, and after hearing Morita's heartfelt words and thinking about their current situation, they all felt like crying.

The good thing about this kind of ruined wealthy family is that the executives who are able to stay have no factions and everyone has feelings for the company. Those who don't have feelings have left long ago.

Japan's semiconductor industry was once glorious, and there is no shortage of jobs in the industry for those who can become senior executives.

"Morita-kun, you are too kind. I believe that everyone here does not want to get rid of the current situation and make Nikon return to its peak.

What you just mentioned is a solution. This is not a lithography machine, and it is not done by Nikon.

We need to do a good job of packaging in the initial stage. By the time we have results, even if American can react, it will be too late. By that time, the semiconductor manufacturing equipment we cooperated with China has already been shipped on a large scale. "Decheng set the tone. The atmosphere has reached this point, and we have to do it.

Decheng continued, “I will find someone to do the hiding work, it is not enough to just penetrate the empty shell.

We need to be more prepared so that America won't be able to react in time.

I think there are many people in Chiyoda who would be willing to help us.”

(The National Diet Building in Japan is located in Nagata Town, Chiyoda Ward)

After Morita finished speaking, Decheng had already figured it out. A lot of people in Japan would support them.

Not to mention that Japan has an old tradition of overthrowing its superiors, what is more important is that if it does not cooperate with China, Japan will be the first to fall behind in the chip industry.

Decheng had a hunch that not only would they cooperate with China, but Japanese semiconductor companies like Japan Chemical, Sumitomo Chemical, and Kyoto Chemical were all waiting to cooperate with China, trying to get a piece of the pie in the brand new system.

Once China finds a way out with topological semimetals and they become the new basic raw materials for chips, most of the chemical raw materials previously centered around silicon will have to be reshuffled.

Take chemical grinding as an example. Previously, the raw materials used for chemical grinding were all for silicon, but in the future you will not be able to use the raw materials for grinding silicon to grind topological semimetals.

Therefore, among the F4 chips, Japan is the most likely to turn against them. Japan's own share in chip manufacturing is already very small. Not to mention Taiwan and Korea, the two major producers, they can't even compare with America.

Their semiconductor industry is focused on chemical raw materials. If they do not start cooperating with China, then in the future process of topological semimetals replacing silicon, Japan's semiconductor industry will be wiped out like their once glorious semiconductor manufacturing. As for whether topological semimetals are China's technology, whether it can become the cornerstone of the future chip industry, and whether the global industry will accept this, Japanese companies dare not gamble. What if?
They dare not pin their hopes on the will to resist of American, whose performance on perovskite cells is so close.

"Hi! Then there is another question, that is, will China accept our cooperation? You know, China's own lithography technology has advanced to 28nm, and our advantage is not obvious."

After listening to this, Morita said: "China's 28nm is still in the laboratory, and our most advanced lithography technology has reached 5nm.

Not to mention that our accumulation in semiconductor equipment far exceeds that of China. If China pursues yield rate and technology, it will definitely choose to cooperate with us. "

Nikon is indeed in a miserable situation. Its technology can achieve a precision of 5nm, but no customers are willing to buy it. Everyone would rather wait for ASML's production capacity schedule than buy Nikon.

It's become a vicious cycle.

Decheng thought for a long time, and when other executives had finished their discussion, he said, "When necessary, we can take that thing to China for a trade."

The most advanced lithography machine that can be found on Nikon's official website is the NSR-S5E with a precision of 635nm, but in fact their most advanced internal lithography process can reach 2.1nm.

Nikon is investing heavily in the hope of catching the high-speed train of topological semimetals.

When countries around the world began to take action, the Chinese Internet was still full of jubilation, and the pride and joy brought by the chip breakthrough filled the entire Internet.

The number of views of related videos on Bilibili remains high, and everyone's creative enthusiasm has been unprecedentedly stimulated.

Someone edited together what Chen Yuanguang said in a previous interview, "I will reverse all this and bring everyone the next golden age", and the appearance of Ark 100 at the Huawei press conference, and added the BGM of "Chasing Dreams".

The number of likes easily exceeded 10,000.

"I am still too conservative. I thought the golden age that the God of Light talked about would take at least five years, but it has only been a year. When I looked at the comparison between the U.S. stock market and the A-share market, I thought I had read it the wrong way. I kept thinking, is this still the U.S. stock market? Is this still the Myanmar A-share market?"

"Isn't this better than Bo Ran?"

"I just asked if you have ever had such a reversal? This reversal is so light and easy!"

“I’m afraid even the most optimistic people would not have thought that we would be the first to break through the 1nm process.”

"I can only buy a Xiaomi Ultra to support myself. The queue for BYD Xiaomi is more than half a year. Life must be too good."

"Huawei's press conference caused Xiaomi's sales to surge, which is absurd."

Influenced by Huawei's press conference, Xiaomi Ultra's sales have seen another surge. Even though the waiting time is half a year, a large number of users are willing to wait.

Huawei's Extraordinary Master will not be released until the second half of the year, while Xiaomi Ultra is just around the corner. Chinese consumers hope to express their support for Chen Yuanguang in this way.

“Being far ahead is finally more than just a slogan. This time we are really far ahead!”

"I just want to ask who else? The God of Light is a little too invincible."

"Last year it was room-temperature superconductivity, this year it's topological semimetals. I want to ask the God of Light what he's going to do to shock the world next year."

"Don't be so shocked. If you continue to be shocked, the US stock market will follow the same path as the Myanmar A-share market."

"Haven't you seen how fast the old man ages? If he's shocked again, he'll probably have to go to the ICU."

"The old man has aged a lot this year. I think he must be regretting doing this for the past four years. If he hadn't worked for the past four years, he would have definitely picked up a bargain this year."

"Forget it. If he doesn't get elected in 20 years, the Donkey Party will not send him out again this year. 20 years is his last chance."

"In order to ensure the security of the supply chain, America has diversified its industrial investments instead of concentrating them in China as in the past.

They don't dare to break up and say that they are targeting you, and they have to find all kinds of excuses.

It is actually a blessing of our time that we can confine war to the field of science and technology.

From the Hot War to the Cold War to today's technological war, the world's hypocritical peace surrounds our heads like an iron curtain. Those who want to watch the world war for fun lose, while those who want to live a stable life win.

Let's wait and enjoy the good days, the semiconductor-related industries are a big cake.

During this period, many self-media have explained to everyone what topological semimetals are and why this technology can achieve overtaking.

For China, it has become impossible to limit the development of China's AI through chips. We can produce 1nm chips ourselves. What does this mean?
The Ark chip is only a consumer application. Huawei did not introduce the more important AI chip at the press conference. By using the 1nm process on the AI ​​chip, there is no difference in computing power with Nvidia's most advanced chips. In fact, our chip computing power is even more powerful.

After all, when it comes to 1nm versus 3nm, the process advantages can offset the advantages of architecture and adaptability.

The computing power limit has failed, and it is impossible to hope to widen the gap in AI. We have tried all kinds of tricks in finance, public opinion, and health, but now it is clear that there is no trick left. "

(End of this chapter)