Shenzhen SiCarrier Technologies (新凯来), backed by Shenzhen municipal government and linked to Huawei, has been developing equipment in chip fabrication and has set machines from companies such as ASML, Applied Materials and Lam Research as its benchmark. The machines it is working on involve lithography, chemical vapor deposition, measurement, physical vapor deposition, etching and atomic layer deposition, all fields that are currently dominated by companies from the Netherlands, US and Japan.
SiCarrier has been working closely with Huawei's growing team of specialists in chip production and chip equipment making.SiCarrier claims it has built critical lithography machines that can produce 28nm chips or less advanced chips, a segment currently dominated by ASML, Nikon and Canon. However, it is still hard to verify whether the company will be able to smoothly commercialize such machines.
Chips in the 28nm range are viewed as mature technology, far less advanced than chips built with 5nm or 4nm processes that currently only TSMC, Samsung and Intel are able to produce. Such chips can are important, however, as they are used in a wide range of applications, including microcontrollers for cars and advanced robotics.
"They have started many projects across many different process steps in chipmaking, basically hoping to build all types of machines. They are working very closely with needs and requests from Huawei. ...
Some projects involve hundreds of workers, while others involve thousands of engineers.” SiCarrier has been aggressively hiring experienced engineers from foreign peers in recent years, especially after tighter US export controls led many American chip tool makers in China to downsize.“It is a young company, but they've managed to hire and form a big team with experienced talent from the industry.
”In a recent post on WeChat, SiCarrier said it will launch a wide range of chipmaking equipment machines during the SEMICON China industry fair this week, including a new atomic layer deposition (ALD) tool named Alishan after a famous mountain in Taiwan.Huawei has dedicated substantial resources to developing chipmaking equipment, actively recruiting top engineers with experience at chip leaders such as TSMC and Intel, and major global equipment manufacturers including ASML, Applied Materials, Lam Research, KLA, Tokyo Electron and Screen.
The Chinese tech giant is also building a massive research and development complex for chipmaking machines in Shanghai. Huawei has been collaborating closely with SiCarrier to jointly enhance application engineering expertise and identify key production challenges when implementing chip manufacturing processes
.SiCarrier was founded in Aug 2021 and its major stakeholder is Shenzhen Major Industry Investment Group (深圳市重大产业投资集团), an investment vehicle of the Shenzhen government, which is also a major backer of Huawei-linked chip manufacturers including PengXinWei Integrated Circuit Manufacturing Co (鹏芯微) and SwaySure Technology (昇維旭).
SiCarrier has been working closely with Huawei's growing team of specialists in chip production and chip equipment making.SiCarrier claims it has built critical lithography machines that can produce 28nm chips or less advanced chips, a segment currently dominated by ASML, Nikon and Canon. However, it is still hard to verify whether the company will be able to smoothly commercialize such machines.
Chips in the 28nm range are viewed as mature technology, far less advanced than chips built with 5nm or 4nm processes that currently only TSMC, Samsung and Intel are able to produce. Such chips can are important, however, as they are used in a wide range of applications, including microcontrollers for cars and advanced robotics.
"They have started many projects across many different process steps in chipmaking, basically hoping to build all types of machines. They are working very closely with needs and requests from Huawei. ...
Some projects involve hundreds of workers, while others involve thousands of engineers.” SiCarrier has been aggressively hiring experienced engineers from foreign peers in recent years, especially after tighter US export controls led many American chip tool makers in China to downsize.“It is a young company, but they've managed to hire and form a big team with experienced talent from the industry.
”In a recent post on WeChat, SiCarrier said it will launch a wide range of chipmaking equipment machines during the SEMICON China industry fair this week, including a new atomic layer deposition (ALD) tool named Alishan after a famous mountain in Taiwan.Huawei has dedicated substantial resources to developing chipmaking equipment, actively recruiting top engineers with experience at chip leaders such as TSMC and Intel, and major global equipment manufacturers including ASML, Applied Materials, Lam Research, KLA, Tokyo Electron and Screen.
The Chinese tech giant is also building a massive research and development complex for chipmaking machines in Shanghai. Huawei has been collaborating closely with SiCarrier to jointly enhance application engineering expertise and identify key production challenges when implementing chip manufacturing processes
.SiCarrier was founded in Aug 2021 and its major stakeholder is Shenzhen Major Industry Investment Group (深圳市重大产业投资集团), an investment vehicle of the Shenzhen government, which is also a major backer of Huawei-linked chip manufacturers including PengXinWei Integrated Circuit Manufacturing Co (鹏芯微) and SwaySure Technology (昇維旭).
