gambit
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For the sake of discussion, let us assume that China seized not just TSMC but all foreign owned semicon plants.
All products in their processing lines will continue as normal until completion, that means from wafer start to wafer end. But wafer end the problematic point. In general, wafer start to wafer end is considered a 'fab' stage and is administratively and technically distinct from the rest of the product flow. The administrative and technical stages are critical to the seizure. Once a wafer is finished, the fab essentially washed its hands of the wafer. The die extraction and packaging is considered a new 'customer' stage even if the extraction/packaging process belongs to the same company. The fab stage is called 'front end'. Anything after is, of course, the 'back end'.
The reason is that the final customers determine how the dies are packaged. One customer requirement may have stacked dies and packaged. Another customer requirement maybe the normal single die package. Another customer requirement maybe bare wafer and this is unique and call 'wafer sales agreement' where the customer may do their own extraction and packaging for even more unique applications such as radiation hardness for space. The packaging stage, with all of its sub-stages, is called 'post electrical', meaning there is no more electrical testing at the die level. From the packaged step, the customer will have their own electrical testing but that would be under new ownership.
The day that China make the PHYSICAL seizure of a fab, meaning police and military forces are actually in the facility and took custodial responsibilities, all post fab future orders will stop. Current contracts maybe honored by China, or may not. China can say anything to try to assure everyone of future wafer starts but no one will believe China. Who would be stupid and foolish enough? It is like trusting a thief who just stole your car and offered you a ride in your own car because the car is now 'his' by virtue of possession. Depending on the product, a wafer start can be a couple weeks to a few months until wafer end and under the assumption that nothing will go wrong.
Battling Fab Cycle Times
Battling Fab Cycle Times Why it's taking longer to manufacture chips at 10/7nm and what can be done about it.
semiengineering.com
But now toss in the fact that the fab is now under forced new ownership to another. The technical disruptions (plural) in a wafer flow will be inevitable. A disruption is called an 'excursion' and is always bad. A out of temperature condition in a chemical vat is an excursion. Someone sneezed and some particulates escaped the mask is an excursion. And so on. Now the entire fab crew just learned that the fab has been seized by the government and no technical issues will arise? Who is going to be stupid enough to accept his batch of wafers even if the wafers are paid for? China certainly cannot force anyone to take their paid for wafers? Even Chinese engineers will be suspicious of those wafers. We are looking at literally tens of thousands of wafers -- scrapped.
Once the tech node is below 15 nano, the process's intolerance for excursions, meaning most likely the wafer is immediately scrapped, increases several folds, simply because the physical structures of the various devices got thinner and finer, and does not take much to damage them to beyond rework/repair. The more complex the product, such as a CPU, the less likely the rework/repair. Scrapped.
From this point one, the entire fab will be useless. Chinese engineers and administrators will take over but what next? New wafer starts? For who? Even Chinese customers will follow established protocols and will treat the new wafer starts as engineering wafers and do their own tests before accepting the new wafers as normal products. So now we are looking at yrs, not months, before the fab under new ownership can start making money again. No international customers will trust Chinese semicon products for several yrs or even a decade. They will let Chinese auto makers, appliance makers, the PLA, and the Chinese space agency take the risks of using semicon products from these seized fabs. Sorry, but the pictures and videos of ordinary people are more important than the lives of a few Chinese astronauts, soldiers, sailors, and airmen. Each wafer have a marker call 'scribe' to start a chain of identification.
Laser Scribing for Wafer ID
Laser Scribing for Wafer ID MPE, Inc. operates fiber laser systems for scribing text on silicon wafers and other semiconductor wafers. Laser scribe is also referred to as laser marking, laser scribing, laser engraving, and serialization. Laser scribe service is often needed by wafer resizing...
China can always forge these IDs and people know it. China just seized someone else's property, so why should I buy ANY semicon products from China because now any semicon products from mainland China can come from the seized fab? Myself, I have taken apart a USB flash drive I bought from Best Buy, found the packaged die, got its ID, and traced its history back to Micron's facility in Shanghai. If I wanted to, I could even find the chain of process equipment that die was on. I can even find all engineers/technicians sign-offs for all processes. ISO audits looks at these records and certify entire companies, not just individual facilities. So who is going to be stupid and foolish enough to believe whatever China said about these seized facilities?
Recommendations to seize foreign owned semicon assets do not contain the above arguments for the public but behind closed doors, the Chinese government know full well the technical issues involved. NO ONE on this forum can dispute what I said above. So now go we go back to the point that seizing foreign own semicon assets on mainland China will be strictly for propaganda purposes and the guy who recommended it, this time, knows it.
