NEWS

Currently, the semiconductor industry is undergoing an unprecedented period of transformation that sweeps across the entire industrial chain and encompasses all technical dimensions. This transformation is not only an inevitable outcome of technological iteration but also an objective reflection of the global landscape's reconfiguration. It marks a profound shift in the semiconductor industry from scale-driven to value-driven, and from single-point competition to ecosystem collaboration. The gradual deceleration of Moore's Law has broken the development inertia that has persisted for over half a century, while the exponential growth in AI computing demands has emerged as a new growth engine, strongly propelling the industry towards an accelerated evolution beyond Moore's Law. At the same time, multiple factors such as geopolitical games, global policy adjustments, technological route iterations, and intensified market competition and cooperation are deeply intertwined and interact with each other, causing the global semiconductor supply chain to bid farewell to its previous efficient and flat division model and face a comprehensive and deep reconstruction. The development logic of the industry has also undergone a fundamental transformation, gradually moving from the previous zero-sum game of vicious competition to a new stage of complementary advantages and collaborative innovation. DOHONE, a Wafer Cassette manufacturer, is well aware of this and is currently making forward-looking arrangements to adapt to the changes in the semiconductor industry.

Moore's Law, proposed by Gordon Moore, the founder of Intel, in 1965, was the core engine driving the rapid development of the global technology industry for over half a century. Its prediction that "the number of transistors on a chip of the same area would double every 18-24 months, with performance doubling and prices halving" profoundly dominated the technical path and development rhythm of the semiconductor industry. From vacuum tubes to silicon-based chips, from personal computers to smartphones, almost all information technology innovations bear the imprint of Moore's Law. However, today, this "bible of the technology industry" is approaching its end and gradually entering a deceleration phase. When the chip process enters the 5nm era, the size of transistors has shrunk to the atomic level, and the quantum tunneling effect leads to chip leakage and unstable performance, with heat dissipation problems becoming increasingly prominent. The size reduction of silicon-based semiconductors is approaching its ultimate physical limit. At the same time, the economic pressure brought by "Moore's Second Law" is becoming increasingly heavy. The investment in an advanced process production line has soared from 2 billion US dollars to over 20 billion US dollars, far exceeding the construction cost of a nuclear power plant. More and more enterprises are forced to withdraw from the high-end chip race due to their inability to bear the continuous R&D and equipment investment. The era of relying solely on process refinement to improve performance is coming to an end. 

In sharp contrast to the deceleration of Moore's Law, the exponential growth of AI computing demands is injecting new vitality into the semiconductor industry and becoming the core driving force for the industry's accelerated evolution beyond Moore's Law. With the breakthroughs in artificial intelligence technology and the rapid development of commercial applications, training an advanced large language model requires parameters in the trillions, consuming computing power equivalent to that of a supercomputer running continuously for several months. This explosive demand for computing power has completely shattered the traditional logic of "doubling the number of transistors = doubling performance", forcing the semiconductor industry to break through technical bottlenecks and restructure product forms and architectures. Against this backdrop, sub-sectors such as computing chips, high-performance memory (HBM), and high-speed optical modules are experiencing explosive growth. Companies like Cambricon and Moore Threads have achieved record-high revenues, while memory enterprises like Montage Technology and Biwin Storage have seen significant increases in net profits. Optical chip companies like Shijia Photonics have achieved both volume and profit growth. The growth engine of the semiconductor industry is shifting from consumer electronics like mobile phones and PCs to AI and data centers, driving the industry's transformation from "pursuing transistor miniaturization" to "pursuing system performance improvement", and opening up new technological paths such as advanced packaging, new material applications, and heterogeneous integration.

The deep logic of industrial transformation is driving a fundamental shift in the development philosophy of the semiconductor industry, moving from the previous zero-sum game to a new stage of collaborative innovation. In the past, competition in the semiconductor industry was mainly focused on technological monopolies and market share battles, with companies being closed off from each other and engaging in cutthroat competition, attempting to gain an advantage through single technological breakthroughs or scale expansion. However, in the face of the triple challenges of physical limits, economic costs, and computing power demands, a single enterprise can no longer achieve breakthroughs across the entire technology chain. Collaborative innovation has become an inevitable choice for the development of the industry. This collaboration is not only reflected in the deep binding of upstream and downstream in the industrial chain, such as joint research and development between equipment manufacturers and chip manufacturers, and collaborative innovation between material suppliers and design enterprises, but also in global complementary advantages, breaking regional barriers, and integrating global resources to jointly overcome technical challenges and improve the industrial ecosystem. TSMC's introduction of CoWoS packaging technology and its collaboration with multiple parties to achieve heterogeneous integration, as well as Applied Materials' establishment of the EPIC R&D center to bring together global memory giants to jointly tackle AI memory bottlenecks, all these cases confirm the value of collaborative innovation and mark the entry of the semiconductor industry into a new stage of "coexistence and co-prosperity, collaborative development". Future competition will no longer be a contest between individual enterprises, but a competition between industrial ecosystems and technology alliances, with collaborative innovation capabilities becoming a key manifestation of the core competitiveness of enterprises and even countries in the semiconductor industry.