1991 Starting from the core

Vincenti spent a day in Yuanxin Technology Park. He visited several departments of Yuanxin except the dust-free workshop with great interest. Especially after seeing the mobile communication department, he said that there were probably only Yuanxin in the mainland. Only then could such a large R\u0026D team be established in just two years.

Of course, he didn't know that Yuan Xin was the only one in the entire mainland... and that he could only be called half of the team.

At noon the next day, Su Xinghe also returned to the science and technology park and had lunch with Vincenti as the chairman of Yuanxin. During this period, Su Xinghe did not mention the matter of cooperation - he needed to use practical actions to stand up for his son and show that his son was the actual helmsman of the entire Yuanxin.

…

"Lao Jiang contacted relevant companies during the TB exhibition. We can confirm for the time being that if we only look at equipment, we can actually put together a wafer factory now, such as the current laboratory."

Su Yuanshan and his father were walking under a 30-meter-long grape trellis. Su Yuanshan strongly requested transplanting this grape trellis last year. He said that walking under the grape trellis would provide shade, and secondly, it would be easy to walk along while the grapes were bearing fruit. Picking it up and eating it makes you happy just thinking about it.

He thought it was quite beautiful, but he forgot that this thing is the easiest to attract mosquitoes. If you are not lucky, you might get a bed bug on your head after walking around.

Currently, in the clean room of Yuanxin, in addition to a photolithography machine, there is also foreign garbage collected from NEC. These foreign garbage can barely cut out five-inch wafers. Coupled with a set of equipment such as etching and photolithography, Yuanxin Laboratory can still produce a few chips regardless of the low cost.

Su Xinghe looked at his son with a smile: "In a wafer factory, process technology and technology are very important."

Su Yuanshan nodded: "In a sense, the process technology surpasses the equipment."

“The reason why domestic equipment and processes are introduced in packages is because, firstly, there is nothing, and secondly, they hope to upgrade the process after thoroughly understanding the technology, but now it seems that this road is about to fail.”

Su Yuanshan pursed his lips, looked at the end of the grape trellis, and frowned: "At the end of the manufacturing process, it is actually math, physics and chemistry, and the current situation of our basic disciplines... To be honest, there are no foreign experts and no returnees who have returned with technology. It’s really hard to figure out.”

As the chip industry that stands at the pinnacle of "man-made objects", the importance of process technology is actually far greater than that of equipment - the simplest example is that in later generations, TSMC's 7nm will dominate the world, GlobalFoundries, Samsung, and UMC , TI and others can't catch up, and Intel's 10nm has been delayed for many years - you know, they don't have any restrictions.

As for Samsung catching up later, it was also because Lao Liang passed by.

Thinking of Liang Mengsong and Su Yuanshan, I feel heartbroken. Last year, Liang Mengsong still followed the original trajectory and returned to TSMC. At that time, Yuan Xin was not even qualified to contact others...

He is a process engineer in a wafer fab, but Yuanxin doesn’t even have half a production line, so how can he recruit people?

"Take your time." Seeing his son frown, Su Xinghe smiled and patted his shoulder, comforting him, "I heard that Jianguo is over there in the clean room, researching process technology?"

"Well, that's right. I asked him to explore copper interconnection technology." Su Yuanshan said with a self-deprecating smile: "We thought too far and moved too fast, and there are very few people who can help now."

The copper interconnection technology here naturally refers to a process of replacing the existing aluminum metal interconnection material with copper metal material for the integrated circuit interconnection layer. Compared with aluminum, copper has good resistance and temperature resistance. It is the core process technology for increasing frequency in the future.

TSMC was the first to develop copper interconnects under the 0.13 micron process, surpassing UMC in one fell swoop.

Now Su Yuanshan proposed the concept nearly five years earlier.

Of course Su Yuanshan cannot master the copper interconnection process, but he knows the direction.

Since the diffusion coefficient of copper in silicon dioxide is very large and the adhesion is also very weak, a barrier layer must be placed outside the copper interconnect wires to prevent its diffusion. In order to better plate copper, it is necessary to first generate a thin Cu seed layer on the process circuit...

The methods for generating Cu seed layer include physical vapor deposition, chemical vapor deposition and atomic layer deposition.

After the copper seed layer is generated, it can be electroplated and finally polished to complete the interconnection.

At present, Chen Jianguo is replenishing relevant knowledge while running around the country visiting experts in related fields.

As his junior brother and the proposer of the project, Su Yuanshan could only support him financially...

…

The father and son separated downstairs in the office building. Su Xinghe was very busy. He had to make the final technical summary of the 16-bit microcontroller and help his son make money.

And Su Yuanshan is also busy doing experiments.

Now Yuanxin's various laboratories are fully booked.

Because in addition to the experiments to be done here in the Science and Technology Park, schools such as Electrical Engineering, Provincial University, and Polytechnic have also submitted applications for various experiments.

Of course, these schools have laboratories, but the newly established Yuanxin Technology Park has unparalleled advantages in terms of the advanced level of equipment and the completeness of the equipment.

So... the current situation is that even if Su Yuanshan comes to the physics laboratory, he has to wait for arrangements.

Entering the laboratory, he saw a familiar person in front of the Hall effect experimenter.

"Sister Qu Hui?" Su Yuanshan called softly.

Qu Hui still had short hair and was analyzing data with a technician. After hearing this, she turned back and smiled at Su Yuanshan: "I heard that you are also going to do a Hall effect test?"

"Yeah, but it's okay. I'm just having fun, you guys are busy." Su Yuanshan smiled, then thought about it and asked: "What are you doing this experiment for?"

"Oh, I want to analyze the interference problem of the Hall sensor." Qu Hui pursed her lips and walked towards Su Yuanshan: "The servo motor team did it. I came over to take a look."

"Oh! Then I'll wait." Su Yuanshan paused and said with a smile: "Hall effect testers are very cheap. Let's buy more next time."

At this moment, someone immediately received the call: "Mr. Shan, build more atomic force microscopes."

Another voice came in: "There is also a scanning electron microscope."

"..."

Yuanxin Technology Park mainly has two relatively large physics laboratories, one of which is an optical laboratory and the other is a laboratory where he mainly conducts condensed matter physics research.

Now these guys have turned his condensed matter laboratory into a regular laboratory, and various basic experiments have been performed rapidly.

Su Yuanshan was also a little drunk.

Seeing that everyone was preparing to make a list, Su Yuanshan quickly said goodbye to Qu Hui.

Just when he was about to exit the laboratory, Ye Rudai's little head just reached through the door.

"leaf?"

"Brother Xiaoshan." Ye Rudai was startled and immediately said happily: "What a coincidence."

"Yeah." Su Yuanshan chuckled and stood next to Ye Rudai: "Are you going to do the experiment?"

"No, let me ask about the data." Ye Rudai's eyes flickered and she pointed to the innermost part: "Let's see if the test results and the simulation function are correct."

Su Yuanshan nodded with a smile: "Then you go over, I'll wait for you, and then we go up there to take a look."

"Okay." Ye Rudai responded simply and walked quickly to the innermost place.