Over 20 semiconducter companies submit EOIs for PLI scheme in India

[FairAndUnbiased]

What node is most economical depends on the production run size.

For the prime majority 1 man fablesses companies who have no volume at all, the only thing they can afford is 200mm, hence 180nm.

200mm is fantastically profitable given how how old the node is.

A lot of fabs sell dry, planar litho on 55nm. Sometimes with SOI.

What the biggest difference after immersion is that Japanese tool makers completely dropped out of the race, hence tool cost starting to go stratospheric.

ASML itself may not be willing to babysit completely new entrants for little money.

Maximum what Indians can buy on short notice would be 2nd hand Japanese steppers, which, surprise, been nearly all bought by 3rd tier fabs 4-5 years ago in anticipation of the supply crunch on mature nodes.

200 mm is also widely used in analog, sensor, automotive, etc. I believe it's good for making many custom runs as opposed to going for pure volume since you don't commit as much to one wafer. You aren't necessarily stuck at 180 nm for 200 mm either, I believe there's at least 65 nm tools for 200 mm.

from an equipment perspective, I believe it's easier to design tools for 200 mm to do tricky chemistries like molecular beam epitaxy, MOCVD, ALD etc. due to the amount of off-the-shelf parts that 'just fit' 200 mm, the availability of metal seals for UHV and aggressive chemistries, and the equipment can still be human assembled. When you move up to 300 mm, components start to weigh more which requires machine assembly, seal areas increase 50% (and thus leak rates) and you need to start using specialized connections like SEMI E21-91 with elastomer seals, which may not be inert to some aggressive process chemistries.

You also get less freedom to pick between manual and auto when you go up to 300 mm due to the weight of the wafer cassettes increasing. People say auto is always better, but a little bit of manual is good for flexibility while auto is good for volume. You can always automate 200 mm more, but it's hard to manualize 300 mm.

but of course, that is based on assuming there's a choice between 200 mm and 300 mm, and your organization is choosing to focus on certain markets.

India isn't in that situation. they don't have 300 mm capabilities. they are barely capable of using their 200 mm capabilities.

 

[Paul2]

200 mm is also widely used in analog, sensor, automotive, etc. I believe it's good for making many custom runs as opposed to going for pure volume since you don't commit as much to one wafer. You aren't necessarily stuck at 180 nm for 200 mm either, I believe there's at least 65 nm tools for 200 mm.

I have yet to see one of such, but what's the point of going for 65 nm if you have no volume, and you don't manufacture anything high performance.

People will not be paying for performance on a decade+ old node, for that they will go to something much newer.

 

[Paul2]

You have seen Bangladesh Volume too for cellphones - could they profitably make SoCs locally?

No, you need to add 3 zeros to the volume to genuinely intrigue the fab owners, and 4 zeroes for them to actually fight for the market.

So far, there is only 1 market they fight for: China.

China is more than half of all semiconductor sales in the world.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

I have yet to see one of such, but what's the point of going for 65 nm if you have no volume, and you don't manufacture anything high performance.

People will not be paying for performance on a decade+ old node, for that they will go to something much newer.

I have yet to see one of such, but what's the point of going for 65 nm if you have no volume, and you don't manufacture anything high performance.

People will not be paying for performance on a decade+ old node, for that they will go to something much newer.

Surprisingly, there are customers paying for brand new 200 mm fab equipment and fabs:

Nanochip Fab Solutions | Applied Materials

www.appliedmaterials.com

22 new 200mm fabs in capacity boom

Semiconductor manufacturers worldwide are on track to boost 200mm fab capacity with 22 new fabs and 950,000 wafers, up 17 percent from 2020 through 2024.

www.eenewseurope.com

They're even reengineering 200 mm tools for better productivity:

Applied Materials - Home | Semiconductor, Display and Solar

Applied Materials, Inc. is the global leader in materials engineering solutions for the semiconductor, flat panel display and solar photovoltaic (PV) industries.

www.appliedmaterials.com

 

[Paul2]

Surprisingly, there are customers paying for brand new 200 mm fab equipment and fabs:

Nanochip Fab Solutions | Applied Materials

www.appliedmaterials.com

22 new 200mm fabs in capacity boom

Semiconductor manufacturers worldwide are on track to boost 200mm fab capacity with 22 new fabs and 950,000 wafers, up 17 percent from 2020 through 2024.

www.eenewseurope.com

They're even reengineering 200 mm tools for better productivity:

Applied Materials - Home | Semiconductor, Display and Solar

Applied Materials, Inc. is the global leader in materials engineering solutions for the semiconductor, flat panel display and solar photovoltaic (PV) industries.

www.appliedmaterials.com

Yes, as I said, 200mm is fantastically profitable, especially for low volume. 180nm lead times were longer than 12 months for last 5 years.

And saying low volume, I mean things like automotive ICs, MCUs, logic ASICs, RF, etc. Not that small of a niche, despite it being just around 1%-2% of semi industry.

People were ridiculing SMIC for building world's biggest 200mm fab with brand new equipment in 2016. Now they bit off their tongues.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

Yes, as I said, 200mm is fantastically profitable, especially for low volume. 180nm lead times were longer than 12 months for last 5 years.

And saying low volume, I mean things like automotive ICs, MCUs, logic ASICs, RF, etc. Not that small of a niche, despite it being just around 1%-2% of semi industry.

People were ridiculing SMIC for building world's biggest 200mm fab with brand new equipment in 2016. Now they bit off their tongues.

That underestimates automotive, analog, MCU, etc. they may only be 1-2% of silicon area, but not of revenue.

Looks to me like semiconductor total is $430 billion USD while More Than Moore applications like microcontrollers are $18 billion USD, automotive is $40 billion USD, RF is $4 billion USD. I believe that China is well positioned for the growth in non-computing applications because 200 mm wafer processes are likely to utilize some Chinese technological advantages (such lack of clear market leaders, versatility to process non silicon materials).