The Taiwanese company TSMC and South Korean Samsung are the two semiconductor manufacturers that have the most advanced integration technologies in production. In fact, both manufacture 3 Nm Integrated Circuits Since 2022. However, for many months the performance per wafer they obtained was very improvable, which transformed its 3 nm nodes into a bottleneck that perceptibly increased the cost of these chips.
Three years later the 3 Nm nodes of these two companies are much finer. Its performance by wafer has increased perceptibly and presumably is already exceeding 70% established by the semiconductor industry as a reference. Currently these two companies are in a relatively comfortable position, but there is a company that seems to be prepared to disturb them. To them already intel. His name is Rapidus corporation, he is Japanese and plans to manufacture 2 Nm semiconductors with an unpublished technology and unbeatable mate performance.
Rapidus is the spearhead of Japan
In 1988 NEC, Toshiba, Hitachi, Fujitsu, Mitsubishi, Matsushita and other Japanese companies monopolized no less than 50% of the chip industry. However, today none of these companies is positioned among the leaders of a sector dominated with iron fist by Taiwanese, American, Dutch, South Korean and German companies. Whatever the government of Japan is determined to recover its ancient glory.
The administration led by Shigeru ishiba claims the preeminent position he had in the semiconductor industry three decades ago. Its economy is at stake. But it has a plan. And it is already underway. In fact, he began to display his strategy to reinforce his integrated circuit industry more than two years ago, so the first results begin to see the light.
Japan is currently investing more money in its integrated circuits sector than the US, Germany, France or the United Kingdom
Japan is currently investing more money in its sector of integrated circuits than the US, Germany, France or the United Kingdom. Not in terms of net value, but its effort is greater if we weigh the investment of these countries on their gross domestic product (GDP). The US dedicates 0.21% of its GDP to its semiconductor industry, and Germany 0.41%. France, according to Nikkei Asia, 0.2%, and, finally, the United Kingdom 0.04%. The difference is very significant and puts on the table the effort that Japan is making with 0.71% of its GDP.
As expected, Japanese companies have a leading role in the reconstruction plan of the Japanese chips industry. Tokyo Electron, Canon and Nikon are the main designers and manufacturers of integrated circuit production equipment. And JSR Corporation leads the production of photorestoning materials. Curiously, it is necessary to pour these fluids on silicon wafers with the purpose of preparing them for the transfer of the geometric pattern that delimits the distribution of transistors, connections and other elements that make up an integrated circuit.
The surprising thing is that, in reality, none of the companies I just mentioned is the best trick of Japan to catapult the competitiveness of its semiconductor industry. Not even JSR, which, as we have just seen, leads the manufacture of photorers. The company that is intended for compete from you to you With TSMC, Intel or Samsung in the chip production market is Rapidus corporation. In fact, it has been expressly created to replace Japan at the forefront of integrated circuits.
The website of this company explains the background that has triggered its constitution and its purposes in the following six “commandments”:
- The importance of semiconductors has increased, and, at the same time, the growing concern for the decline of the chips industry in Japan has done so.
- The role of semiconductors in economic security has become an urgent matter. Many integrated circuit factories are located in Taiwan and Continental China.
- Given the increase in the use of semiconductors in cars and artificial intelligence, as well as the added value of the chips in the devices that will arrive during the next decade, it is necessary to guarantee manufacturing in Japan.
- After the summit between Japan and the US, both countries are developing next -generation semiconductors.
- It is necessary to establish 3D LSI technology (Large Scale Integration o large -scale integration) next -generation and nanosheet GAA (Gate-All-Around) in collaboration with the US and Europe, as well as build a cooperation framework with the manufacturers of materials and equipment in Japan and abroad.
- Our purpose is to establish an integrated circuit factory of 2 Nm avant -garde in Japan.
The first four precepts recognize to what extent Japan has lost the relevance that had decades ago in the chips industry and support the need for rebuild a sector which currently has a strategic role. And the last two slogans outline the objective of Rapidus in the short and medium term, which goes through competing in the incipient market of the 2 Nm semiconductors in which this year TSMC, Intel and Samsung will enter this year.
Rapidus is making a circuit manufacturing plant integrated in northern Japan in which it plans to produce 2 Nm chips
Rapidus is a very young company. It was founded on August 10, 2022 by the Japanese government with an initial capital of 7,346 million yen (just under 46 million euros) contributed by, and here comes the interesting, Sony, Toyota, Nec, Softbank, Kioxia, dense , Nippon Telegraph and MUFG Bank. The initial capital invested in the constitution of this company is not very bulky, but there is no doubt that the companies that participate in it have an indisputable relevance in the sectors of technology, automotive and telecommunications.
Rapidus is currently putting a circuit manufacturing plant integrated in northern Japan, in the city of Chitose (Hokkaido), in which it plans to produce semiconductors of 2 Nm. According to Nikkei Asia the first prototypes of these chips They will be ready in April 2025but large -scale manufacturing will not arrive at best until 2027. So far there is nothing really surprising because presumably at that time TSMC, Samsung and Intel will already be manufacturing integrated circuits with comparable lithographs.
Rapidus’s competitiveness will come hand in hand with robots and AI
What is causing the new Rapidus factory to monopolize the looks of the semiconductor sector is that, according to Atsuyoshi Koike, which is the president of the company, it will be completely automated. Its purpose is to resort to robots and artificial intelligence (AI) to tune an automated production line that will be specialized in the manufacture of 2 Nm chips for AI applications. Its plan consists, in short, to produce integrated circuits faster, with a lower and more quality cost.
According to Rapidus your automation technology will allow you to reduce the delivery time of your chips by 66%
To manufacture these semiconductors, extreme ultraviolet lithography equipment (UVE) produced by the Dutch Company ASML is used, and practically all manufacturing processes are automatic. However, the tests of test and validation, interconnection and packaging of the chips They are still largely made manually In most of the manufacturing plants. According to Rapidus, its automation technology of all these processes will allow you to reduce the delivery time of your chips by 66% compared to the times they usually offer TSMC and Samsung.
If this Japanese company finally achieves its purpose and its competitors do not improve its efficiency will be able to deliver its semiconductors in a third of the time spent by its rivals. A priori is a stinging enough asset for Rapidus to grow in a perceptible way, although for the moment it is just a conjecture. Whatever this company seems to have everything well tied.
And it is that the government of Japan has announced that it will invest in it for 2025 about 100,000 million yen (just over 624 million euros). In addition, the Hokkaido factory It is already ready And the first A ASML UVE teams have already arrived. In April he plans to deliver the first 2 Nm chips samples to Broadcom, and not long after Meta and Google. Rapidus’s success is not guaranteed. You still have to demonstrate that its strategy is viable from a technical point of view, but on paper it has the financial support and technological muscle necessary to compete from you to you with the great manufacturers of Taiwanese, American, South Korean and Chinese semiconductors.
More information | Rapidus corporation
In WorldOfSoftware | Japan takes the initiative with nuclear fusion and sets an extremely ambitious date: the 2030s
In WorldOfSoftware | Japan has taken the carrier to dominate the chips industry. Prepare a 325,000 million dollar plan
