At present, the most advanced Chinese mainland chip technology is SMIC, which has long realized the 14nm process.

However, as we all know, because SMIC's progress has made the United States feel afraid, SMIC has been put on the blacklist, restricted the equipment of advanced technology, and wants to lock us up under the advanced logic process of 16/14nm, which has been stuck in 14nm.

However, we should be clear that this so-called 14nm process is actually realized under the condition of importing all kinds of equipment. If the equipment made in China is used, it is impossible to realize 14nm at present.

According to some professionals, at present, there is no country in the world that can realize the whole industrial chain of fabs, nor does it have a fab that does not need American technology.

If there is a wafer factory in such a country that can realize the whole industrial chain and does not need American technology, then it must be China, but not now, but in the future.

Take the 14nm process, for example, at present, we also rely heavily on imported equipment, materials and software from the United States, and it will take at least 3-5 years to achieve independent control.

Dozens of equipment and hundreds of processes are involved in the chip production process. Let's just get to the point. From the three links, these three links are monocrystalline silicon wafer manufacturing, the previous process and the latter process.

The first link is the process of turning sand into silicon wafers. At present, domestic wafers that can produce 300mm can be used for 14nm. In fact, equipment imported from the United States is also used, but let's just ignore it and be completely independent.

The focus is on the previous process, where there are at least eight key steps: diffusion, thin film deposition, lithography, etching, ion implantation, CMP polishing, metallization and testing.

The equipment here involves many, the most difficult is the lithography machine, domestic only 90nm, as well as ion implantation, testing and other equipment, domestic in 28nm, as well as Xu Jiao developer, and still in 60nm.

In addition, there are many materials involved here, such as special gas, photomask, photoresist, photoresist auxiliary materials, wet chemicals, targets, polishing fluid, etc., in which the photoresist can only reach 45nm in China, and some targets are blank and need to be imported.

In the latter process, which is mainly closed testing, there are three major domestic manufacturers, ranking among the top 10 in the world, namely, Jiangsu Changdian, Tianshui Huatian, and Tongfu Micropower. The closed testing technology of these three manufacturers has reached 4nm, but many of the equipment used are also imported.

In addition, there are EDA software used to manufacture chips and software used to control fab automation, most of which are made in the United States. Domestic advanced processes are not covered, or even the whole process is not covered. For example, EDA can only cover about 70% of the whole process, and most of the processes are in the links of 28nm, 45nm and 60nm.

So to complete the national production of 14nm process, according to the estimates of the industry, it will take at least 3-5 years, or even 3-5 years may not be enough, but also depends on the R & D progress of domestic manufacturers.

So at present, the domestic chip industry is still quite dependent on the United States, when the real realization of fully independent 14nm, we can be a little harder, now or a little low-key, don't you think?