The Torrent And Dangerous Shoal Of The Third Generation Semiconductor

Although from the perspective of the whole semiconductor device market, silicon material is still the most important basic carrier because of its characteristics of easy access and low cost, but the emerging industry applications represented by new energy vehicles and 5g base stations are presenting a new demand market for semiconductor materials, that is, the third generation semiconductor material applications mainly composed of silicon carbide and gallium nitride.

In terms of the first two generations of semiconductor materials, China started relatively late in related fields, resulting in an objective gap; In the third generation semiconductor field, the global macro starting time is relatively close, and this is a relatively new technology field. At present, the technology gap between the major global substrate material companies is not very big.

In addition, the third generation semiconductor has the characteristics of high pressure resistance, high temperature resistance and low loss, which meets the current application requirements of power semiconductor devices. In related fields, it is expected to become a long-term trend to replace the first generation silicon-based materials with the third-generation semiconductor materials.

Based on these industrial backgrounds and superimposed on the relevant domestic industrial ecology, it has accumulated in the fields of silicon carbide, gallium nitride and other materials. In recent years, the ecology of the third generation semiconductor industry is showing a trend of multi-point flowering.

But at the same time, it should be noted that the third generation semiconductor field, which is still in the process of development and evolution, has not ushered in the node of full mass production and commercial use at present. At the same time, the global market share of China in this field is not as good as that of overseas large factories which have been mature and developed for many years. The mature landing of the entire industry ecology still needs enough time to cultivate.

This is still a branch of semiconductor technology that needs to be kept open to see the bright future. However, the potential challenges can not be ignored.

Upsurge of development

From the perspective of the companies that planned to be listed on the science and technology innovation board before, it is enough to show that in many regions of China, there are companies and teams in the field of third-generation semiconductor.

For example, Shandong Tianyue, which is going through the listing process, Tianke Heda and Jiangxi Ruineng have already terminated the listing process. Even in Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao Bay area, there are also many companies located in different specific material fields and industrial chain links, such as Dongguan Tianyu and innosecco.

Wang Zhihan, chairman of basic semiconductor, told the 21st century economic reporter that behind the upsurge of the third generation semiconductor development, it is mainly driven by internal and external factors.

"With the proposed goals of carbon peaking and carbon neutralization, new energy industry and semiconductor industry have begun to produce more intersections. The use of third-generation semiconductor materials with better performance can help achieve the goal more quickly around the world. " He further said that since the requirements of silicon carbide devices on the process technology are not high compared with that of silicon substrate, the gap between domestic and foreign countries in this respect is not very large, and therefore, domestic leading enterprises in the field of silicon carbide and gallium nitride will have a great possibility to enter the world-class camp.

"At present, the third generation semiconductor has evolved to 6 inches in wafer size, and there is still a process to go to 8 inches for mass production and commercial use." Wang Zhihan analyzed that from this perspective, the pace at home and abroad is relatively close, and there is a great opportunity for further breakthrough.

According to Wang Zhihan, the downstream application market of silicon carbide devices is mainly divided into three major directions: industrial, consumer and automotive. Among them, industrial grade silicon carbide devices have been implemented earlier, and their applications include communication base station power supply, server power supply, LED drive power supply, etc., which are the fields of long-term stable and high-speed development in the future.

In the consumer market, the domestic market is the first to launch products, mainly for the high-power fast charging market.

New energy vehicles are the most important direction of the future development of silicon carbide devices, which is also the largest single application market of silicon carbide. Its excellent characteristics can be used in many parts of new energy vehicles, such as motor controller, vehicle charger, etc.

To this end, basic semiconductor's module packaging research and development teams in Shenzhen and Nagoya, Japan, have launched different product series for the silicon carbide vehicle specification level modules, and hope to start mass application in the market next year.

"Cost is a big concern in the application of third generation semiconductor materials." Wang Zhihan pointed out to reporters, but this also needs to be split. On the one hand, in many application fields, the benefits brought by performance improvement will be higher than the cost, and at this time, they will tend to use silicon carbide, gallium nitride and other materials; On the other hand, although silicon carbide devices are more expensive than silicon-based devices, the cost of other matching components can be greatly reduced by using the former devices.

"With the development of technology and industry, the cost of silicon carbide will gradually decrease, so it will be an irreversible process to replace traditional silicon-based materials and devices in many fields," he said

For example, in power semiconductor devices, replacing silicon substrate IGBT and MOSFET with silicon carbide material is the industry recognized future trend, and the power semiconductor iteration cycle is slow and the life cycle is longer, so the future growth space will be very large.

Wang Zhihan added that at present, the cost of silicon carbide devices is much higher than that of silicon-based devices, but in the future, the cost will inevitably drop to 2-3 times of that of silicon-based devices. At that time, the cost-effectiveness advantages of silicon carbide devices will gradually appear.

Short term challenges

The development of domestic industry chain is in full swing, but what can not be ignored is that behind the continuous exploration of an emerging technology, there are still many challenges that need to be considered and overcome.

Wang Zhihan said that as a start-up enterprise, especially in the third-generation semiconductor field, it will face various difficulties in the process of rapid development. However, compared with the problems of capital, supply chain and customer recognition, he pays more attention to talents.

"The talents of the third generation semiconductor materials, devices, packaging, driving and application are definitely far from meeting the needs of the industry. It is an important way to expand the team through the enterprise's own training or the introduction of experts from overseas. " So he pointed out.

In addition, in order to achieve a balance between the long-term and short-term goals of enterprises in the field of silicon carbide, basic semiconductor cooperates with Tsinghua University and other universities and research institutions to carry out joint research and development in some frontier fields that may not produce direct economic benefits in the short term, but are meaningful for future industrial development.

"We will promote R & D internally for the technology direction that is expected to be industrialized within two years; It will be five years before we have the technology direction of industrialization opportunity. We will actively adopt the way of cooperating with external R & D Wang Zhihan continued.

At the market level, it also faces certain development challenges in the short term. Some industrial investors told reporters that the current industry's attention to the third-generation semiconductor may show signs of excessive enthusiasm“ We've seen a lot of third-generation semiconductor companies, but we don't dare to start. " The person believes that the current domestic valuation of Companies in related industries is on the high side, which is not in line with the conventional valuation method. His team will choose to face the market more prudently at this time.

At the same time, he pointed out that under the background of no large-scale market demand, some companies in the industry have begun to build production lines frequently in various places“ Considering that the current sales can not bear such a large cost depreciation, we are worried that some of the production lines invested today will face the problem of insolvency in the next three to five years. "

However, Li Junchao, senior manager of Yunxiu capital, told the 21st century economic reporter that, overall, domestic investment in the third generation semiconductor field is not overheated, because from the overall volume, it has not reached the annual investment intensity of the United States and Japan in related industries.

But at the same time, he pointed out that the current problem that can not be ignored is that the development of inter industry companies is relatively scattered, and the core talents and strength are not integrated together. As a result, looking back several years later, the investment efficiency may be low.

Of course, in this process, companies with competitive strength will still grow up and constantly improve the process of technological change and evolution.

In terms of market structure, due to the high application cost mentioned above, it is still unable to support the large-scale commercial application of the third-generation semiconductor devices. At present, although the number of downstream device manufacturers is large, the volume is still small. On the contrary, the substrate material industry is in the upstream of the industry. Due to the more concentrated accumulated demand, this type of company will develop faster in the early stage“ Of course, with the continuous promotion of business in the future, the opportunities of downstream market will indeed gradually expand. " Li Junchao said.

Even for the European and American companies which have occupied a high share of the global market, their initial starting point is to start with the ability of a single industrial link. With the gradual maturity, they have incorporated more abundant industrial processes through mergers and acquisitions, and become integrated semiconductor companies with platform capabilities.

"Considering that the overall scale of the third-generation semiconductor market is not large at present, it may or may not be necessary to move towards a stage where there is a clear division of design and manufacturing industries as is the case with silicon. Of course, with more and more market space, perhaps industrial division of labor will be a better choice in the future. " Li Junchao pointed out that from this logic, it is indeed a more perfect development route for companies in this field to choose the IDM development mode.

Macroscopically, the orientation and evolution of this industry role is also a new development proposition that the whole semiconductor industry will face in the future.

Wang Yan, managing director of Guoke Ruihua, pointed out to the reporter of 21st century economic report that at present, there are about 20 semiconductor companies in the industry in the European and American markets, but they occupy nearly 90% of the market value and nearly 80% of the profits of the whole market, and they are heading for an oligopoly market.

In contrast, there are no mature and perfect manufacturers in China. However, there have been related industrial companies, in the course of development in recent years, through horizontal and vertical M & A integration, constantly improve the market layout in the subdivision field.

"I believe that in the next 3-5 years, M & A integration between listed semiconductor companies will become a mainstream trend. This will also be a common problem facing the third generation semiconductor market in the future. " He added that by then, the domestic semiconductor market is expected to follow the trend of the European and American semiconductor market, with giant companies occupying large market profits and further enhancing industrial concentration.

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