According to media reports, the United States is stepping up pressure on South Korea to cooperate with its export controls to China, urging South Korea to only provide advanced chips such as high bandwidth memory (HBM) to its Allies. Experts in the field say that unlike Japan and the Netherlands, South Korea cannot comply 100 per cent with US export controls because it is highly dependent on exports to China. 

Chip technology is the core technology of the fourth industrial Revolution. High-end general purpose chips have always been the commanding heights in the field of frontier science and technology, and their manufacturing technology represents the highest level of ultra-precision manufacturing in the world. At present, China is increasing its support for chip research and development to build a semiconductor industry with competitive advantages. What important references can be brought by the path and experience of chip research and development in developed countries? Follow the "People's Forum" exclusive article.

The semiconductor industry chain is very complex, and the chip manufacturing process can be roughly divided into wafer material manufacturing, chip research and development and design, chip manufacturing, wafer testing, packaging and finished product testing. As the core link of the semiconductor industry chain, chip research and development started in the United States in the 1950s and has gone through nearly 70 years of history.

In the current global semiconductor market share ranking, the United States, South Korea and Japan are the top three. The United States is the birthplace of the semiconductor industry, and Japan and South Korea are late developing countries in this industry field. The chip development paths of the three developed countries have some commonalities.

Early chip research and development and the government's strong support and guidance are inseparable

In February 1959, Texas Instruments was the first to release chip products. Because chip technology is highly suitable for military needs, the US government invests in large-scale at any cost, and the US National Science Foundation and the US Department of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency support scientific research institutions and enterprises such as Stanford University, Bell LABS, IBM, Texas Instruments and Silicon Valley Fairchild Semiconductor Company in the form of projects. Statistics released by the U.S. Department of Commerce show that in 1958, when the chip was born, the U.S. government directly allocated $4 million for research and development support, in addition to up to $9 million in order contracts. In the six years following the invention of the chip, the U.S. government funded the chip project to the amount of $32 million, 70% of which came from the Air Force. During the same period, about 85% of the R&D funding of the semiconductor industry in the United States comes from the government, and the support of the government has achieved the technological advantage of the United States in the semiconductor field. From the mid-1950s to the early 1960s, at least 70-80% of semiconductor companies' R&D funding was obtained from government procurement contracts. In 1962, Texas Instruments supplied 22 sets of chips for the Minuteman missile guidance system, the first time chips were used in a missile guidance system. As late as the 1960s, 80 percent of chip products in the United States were still purchased by the Department of Defense.

Later, with the development of the semiconductor industry and the expansion of the market, private capital gradually entered, and the US government duly introduced more than a dozen laws such as the Small Business Investment Company Act and the Credit Guarantee Act to encourage venture capital and further promote chip technology innovation and industrialization. When the industry entered a period of rapid growth, the U.S. government began to gradually dilute its intervention in the industry, through the "second supplier", the prohibition of industry monopoly and other policy adjustments, clearing obstacles for the full competition between enterprises, thus promoting the overall prosperity of the industry. The US government's support for chip research and development and the semiconductor industry has largely contributed to the close interaction between the school and the industry represented by Stanford University, and many famous companies in Silicon Valley have benefited from the scientific research achievements of the school.

Not long after Texas Instruments released its chip products, the Japanese government realized that chips represented the future of the semiconductor market. In December 1960, Japan's Ministry of International Trade and Industry (abbreviated as the Ministry of International Trade and Industry) under the Institute of Industrial Technology Electrical test Institute successfully developed Japan's first chip. In 1962, NEC bought the license for planar lithography technology from Fairchild Semiconductor of the United States, started from zero, and achieved an annual output of 50,000 chips in three years. In 1966, "integrated circuit" was officially included in the industry statistics of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry. In 1971 and 1978, the Japanese government formulated the "Temporary Measures Law for the revitalization of Specific Electronic Industry and Specific Machinery Industry" and the "Temporary Measures Law for the revitalization of Specific Machinery Information Industry" respectively. Both of these regulations stipulate that it is necessary to strengthen the experimental research and production of semiconductor production technologies such as chips that Japan has not mastered or that lag far behind foreign countries; The Ministry of International Trade and Industry needs to promote relevant research according to the technical difficulty, advanced nature and maturity. This policy has promoted the learning, absorption and transformation of foreign advanced technologies in the semiconductor field by Japanese enterprises, and laid the foundation for the implementation of the joint combination technology innovation action plan for VLics.

In 1976, Japan launched the research and development program of "very large scale Integrated circuits for next generation electronic computers" (VLSI), the core of which is the research and development of advanced process memory and semiconductor production equipment. The VLSI program is led by the Ministry of International Trade and Industry, with the participation of five semiconductor companies - NEC, Hitachi, Toshiba, Fujitsu and Mitsubishi - and the formation of a research portfolio with research institutions such as the Japan Institute of Industrial Technology. The Board of Directors is the highest decision-making body of the VLSI portfolio, chaired by the presidents of the five companies in turn, and the secretary general is the representative of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry. The results of the VLSI program are owned by the government, but companies participating in the program can share their technological achievements. The VLSI portfolio lasted four years and raised 73.7 billion yen in research and development funds, with the Japanese government investing about 29.1 billion yen in the form of interest-free loans. The research and development funds provided by the VLSI portfolio in different years account for 25% to 66% of the total R&D investment of the semiconductor industry in Japan, which is equivalent to two to three times the combined R&D investment of the five member companies. In order to increase the enthusiasm of member enterprises to participate in joint research and development, the Japanese Ministry of International Trade and Industry also allows enterprises to transfer part of the cooperative research and development funds to the corporate laboratory, which has prompted about 85% of the research and development funds to be allocated to the corporate laboratory. In addition, member companies can also enjoy 8% to 10% of the research and development expenditure tax credit and other tax benefits.

With the help of the VLSI portfolio, Japan has advanced by leaps and bounds in areas such as dynamic memory. Between 1986 and 1991, Japan accounted for nearly half of the global semiconductor market. This has spooked US semiconductor companies. The Semiconductor Industry Association of the United States issued a warning to the national government that the rise of the Japanese semiconductor industry had a serious impact on the United States semiconductor industry and would endanger the national security of the United States. As a result, the United States launched sanctions against Japanese semiconductor industry entities. In October 1985, the U.S. Department of Commerce accused Japanese companies of dumping read-only memory products. In 1986, the Japanese Ministry of International Trade and Industry signed the first U.S.-Japan Semiconductor Agreement with the U.S. Department of Commerce. Under the agreement, the United States temporarily suspended anti-dumping cases against Japanese companies, in exchange for the Japanese government will strengthen the supervision of semiconductor prices, and Japanese companies will buy semiconductors produced by American companies. Japan agreed to set a minimum export price for six types of semiconductor products to the United States and third countries, and no longer dump chips at low prices. Japan also agreed to open its semiconductor market with the goal of foreign companies having a 20% share of the Japanese market by 1991. In 1987, claiming that Japan had not fully complied with the US-Japan Semiconductor Agreement, the United States imposed a 100% punitive tariff on more than $300 million of Japanese chips exported to the United States under "Section 301." The United States has also rejected Japan's Fujitsu's proposed acquisition of Fairchild Semiconductor. In 1991, the United States and Japan signed a second U.S.-Japan Semiconductor Agreement. Since then, the international market share of Japanese semiconductor products has fallen again and again, and the share of dynamic random access memory (DRAM) has fallen from nearly 80% to less than 10%.

At the same time, in 1987, the U.S. government approved the establishment of the Semiconductor Manufacturing Technology Alliance (SEMATECH) by 14 semiconductor manufacturing companies within the United Nations Department of Defense. The alliance's board of directors is made up of executives from 14 companies and government representatives. In the 10 years from its inception in 1987 until the government withdrew in 1996, the U.S. government invested $850 million in the alliance, and member companies also invested 1 percent of their sales in research and development.

In order to build a large semiconductor enterprise to compete with the giant Japanese semiconductor enterprises, since the mid-1980s, the United States has revised a series of laws to eliminate the restrictions of the anti-monopoly law on cooperative research between enterprises, promote the transfer of government-enterprise cooperative research and development and scientific research results to technology application, and promote the improvement of the production process of semiconductor products and equipment. In 1984, the National Cooperative Research Act legally recognized cooperative research among enterprises. The Steven Wilder Act was amended in 1986 and 1989 to allow government-funded research institutions to work with private companies and U.S. manufacturers through collaborative research and development agreements. The US government gradually relaxed the restrictions of the antitrust law, the trial of the 12-year IBM monopoly case was terminated, and the important regulations of the US antitrust policy - the Merger and Acquisition Guide and the Horizontal Merger and Acquisition Guide were revised several times. In a relatively relaxed legal environment, the number of mergers and acquisitions in the US semiconductor industry has risen rapidly. The number of deals worth more than $1 million initiated by US semiconductor companies rose from about six per year between 1980 and 1985 to 18 per year between 1986 and 1990 and 34 per year between 1991 and 1995. The number and value of deals have risen sharply.

The South Korean government's support for chip research and development is mainly reflected in strategic guidance, preferential loans and financial support. At the same time that the Japanese government started the VLSI program, the Korean government also established the Korea Electronics and Communications Research Institute and set up a pilot production line, which successfully produced 16K memory in 1979. This was the beginning of Korea's mastery of memory technology. In 1982, the Korean government issued a "semiconductor Industry revitalization plan" similar to Japan's VLSI program, proposing to achieve localization of electronic parts and semiconductor production. South Korea has established a joint research and development system involving national research institutes, three consortia and six universities, with a total investment of $250 million in research and development over three years, much of it funded by the government. The South Korean government has vigorously guided large companies, especially the chaebol, into the semiconductor sector, offering them preferential loans, tax cuts and other incentives. In the late 1970s, South Korea injected huge amounts of capital into the semiconductor industry through credit instruments, fundamentally changing the investment environment of the large chaebol. In May 1981, Korea implemented the policy of privatizing ordinary banks and handed over 15 ordinary banks to conglomerates. South Korea's three major semiconductor companies in the beginning of the development of semiconductor business have experienced many years of huge losses, all rely on the Bank of Korea in the direct intervention of the government to continue to give loan support, policy loans in all the loans of South Korea's major banks accounted for as high as 60%. In 1986, the South Korean government listed the development of 4M memory as a national project led by the Korea Electronics and Communications Research Institute. Samsung Electronics, Gold Star, Hyundai and six South Korean universities are jointly working on 4M memory technology, spending $110 million on research and development over three years, with most of the investment still being borne by the government. Even after Samsung Electronics and other companies gained a leading position in memory technology, South Korea still spared no effort to implement supportive policies for chip research and development. In 1994, the Korean government enacted the Semiconductor Chip Protection Act to promote innovation in chip technology. In the same year, the Korean government also formulated a technology development strategy for the electronics industry, focusing on the development of seven strategic technologies, including integrated circuits, and investing 2 trillion won in the next five years to develop the electronics industry, of which 900 billion won will be invested by the government.

Chip research and development attaches great importance to attracting and cultivating talents

The United States promotes the immigration of highly skilled talents to the United States by providing easy access to permanent residency applications for highly skilled talents related to chip research and development and production, as well as families. Since 2022, the US government has continued to relax the requirements for high-level talents in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields to obtain green cards in the US, and increased the opportunities for high-level talents to stay in the US through policy measures such as extending the validity period of employment permits for international students in the US, extending the duration of internship for STEM personnel, and simplifying visa application procedures for STEM graduates. And attract the world's top semiconductor technology talent.

In the final analysis, the development of semiconductor technology in Japan depends on the unremitting efforts of domestic technicians and enterprises. There are a large number of semiconductor technicians in Japan who take semiconductor research and development, design and manufacturing as a noble cause of lifelong struggle. Rich in the spirit of craftsmanship, Japanese enterprises and their employees have been painstakingly studying technology for decades, and engineers with team spirit often pursue technological innovation with workshop workers, jointly put forward reasonable suggestions, and strive to improve the product rate, and corporate managers with dedicated spirit gather technical innovation and reasonable suggestions into collective wisdom. A batch of outstanding semiconductor technology and business management talents have grown up in this process. It can be said that excellent semiconductor technicians, high-quality skilled workers and excellent business managers have provided strong talent support for Japan to rapidly catch up with the advanced technology of the United States.

In the early days of the development of the semiconductor industry, Korean conglomerates such as Samsung Electronics implemented the strategy of "hiring" from competitors. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, when the performance of Japanese semiconductor companies fell sharply, South Korean conglomerates took advantage of the opportunity to attract a large number of semiconductor technology and management talents from overseas rivals such as Toshiba of Japan. Toshiba alone was hired by Samsung Electronics. At the same time, Korean conglomerates have introduced a large number of outstanding engineers and developed many cutting-edge chip technologies through mergers and acquisitions of overseas semiconductor companies. In addition, large consortia in the field of semiconductors in South Korea have also set up research teams and research institutions in dozens of key countries and regions, carried out special recruitment in well-known overseas colleges and universities, and vigorously introduced overseas technical talents. In addition, South Korea also attaches great importance to the cultivation of domestic talents. At the end of the 20th century, the South Korean education department has launched "BK21" and "BK21+" and other programs, costing trillions of won, to provide precise special support to more than 500 universities and research institutions in South Korea; After entering the 21st century, the South Korean government launched the Semiconductor Hope Fund, which enabled South Korean large enterprises, universities and related scientific research institutions to obtain sufficient research funds, and consolidated South Korea's dominant position in the semiconductor field through joint training of production, education and research.