181. Chapter 180 A Bolt from the Blue
Chapter 180 A Bolt from the Blue
Three months have passed since the release of Qin Guang No. 1.
During these three months, Daqin Optics and Datang Heavy Industry have manufactured a total of four EUV lithography machines, one of which was left to Dahan Core Industry, and three were secretly delivered to the Equipment Department.
Originally, the military had two orders left,
But considering that the public has not seen the news of mass production and delivery of domestic EUV lithography machines, different voices have emerged, and many people have begun to doubt that Daqin Optics has not yet achieved mass production of Qin Guang No. 1.
Therefore, the military finally decided that the remaining two machines could be postponed to June.
So on April 2, Daqin Optics’ fifth lithography machine was finally delivered to Lianwei, which won the first place at the procurement meeting, under the witness of major media.
This news immediately made the doubts on the Internet disappear.
Everyone was discussing fiercely what impact the mass production and delivery of domestic lithography machines would have on the chip industry and whether it could reduce the price of electronic products.
At the same time, more and more eyes were focused on the research and development of photoresist.
However, Wu Lihong listened to Kang Chi’s words last time and chose to ignore the external pressure and steadily advance the research and development of photoresist at his normal pace.
Just last month, they also achieved phased results, greatly narrowing the direction and scope of research and development, and are getting closer and closer to the final success.
The news of the mass production and delivery of Qin Guang No. 1 also completely shattered the last fantasy of international semiconductor giants.
Faced with the overwhelming and aggressive Chinese semiconductor industry, the M country semiconductor industry association held an emergency meeting of key members the next day to discuss specific countermeasures in the future.
Participating in this emergency meeting were semiconductor giants such as Pingguo, Qualcomm, Lianfax, Samsung, Sony, Taiwan Electromechanical, and GuGe.
At this meeting, the giants first reached a consensus on the overall situation, that is, the fact that China has broken through the chip technology blockade is basically a foregone conclusion, and the semiconductor war will gradually change from the offensive blockade stage to a stage of equal strength and direct fighting.
To this end, they must give up all illusions and be prepared to fight a tough battle.
Once anyone loses in this technological competition, companies with a market value of hundreds of billions or even trillions of dollars may be reduced to ashes in an instant! At the same time, they unanimously decided that at the last moment of this offensive blockade stage, they will continue to use their chip advantages to carry out the last wave of harvesting and attacking China’s downstream chip industry.
The next day, Xiaomi, Green Factory, Blue Factory, Meizhu, Hongji, Huashuo, Qicaihong, etc., all domestic mobile phone, notebook, computer hardware and other electronic assembly plants, received notices from foreign semiconductor giants.
The reasons for the announcement are varied, and the final conclusion is that their chips will increase in price by 80-120%!
For example, the purchase price of Qualcomm’s third-generation Snapdragon 8 has increased from the original US$160 (approximately RMB 1,168) to US$304 (approximately RMB 2,128), a price increase of up to 90%!
If a mobile phone originally cost 3,999 yuan, if equipped with the third-generation Snapdragon 8, the cost of the chip alone will account for about 25% of the total material cost!
Now it has suddenly increased to 2,128 yuan, and more than half of the money of a mobile phone is CPU. Do you want to buy it or not? And the price increase of chips is only one of them.
Second, the Android system will also be charged!
In order to successfully acquire Motorola, Google signed an agreement with China’s Ministry of Commerce, promising that the Android system will be free for domestic brands within 5 years.
But later the free period was over, and they didn’t charge.
Not only in China, in order to popularize the Android system, they have been free all over the world, until 2019, when Google finally began to harvest.
However, their first target was Ouzhou, and then they were fined nearly 5 billion US dollars by the Oumeng Committee, directly breaking the record of fines.
But fines are fines. In counterattack, Google adjusted the rules for manufacturers to use Android, and each device still had to pay 20 to 40 US dollars. Anyway, it was a hard fight.
This actually caused the profits of domestic mobile phones exported to Ouzhou to decline.
And now, they have finally aimed their next gun at the Chinese market.
Of course, this is actually easy to solve. JustFollow the example of the Ou Meng committee and find an opportunity to impose a fine.
The system is replicable, and the actual restriction space is limited. If you act rogue, I will act rogue too.
If you charge a reasonable fee, it is not impossible to pay the patent fee. After all, we are all civilized people. To protect intellectual property rights together, everyone has to collect some patent fees, right? But the chip is physical hardware. If you fine him, he will simply not sell it. What can you do? In short, these notices immediately triggered an 18-magnitude earthquake in the semiconductor field of China!
When President Lei saw these notices, he was immediately struck by a bolt from the blue. His eyes went dark and he almost went to the hospital.
Qualcomm’s Xiaolong 8gen3, wcn7851 WIFI chip, 77042 amplifier, sdr753 RF chip, and Soni’s CMOS chip,
All prices have increased! Just, It feels like the sky is falling! He immediately called Qualcomm and Soni to ask if he had offended the big guys, but they didn’t answer his call.
It’s clear that it’s up to you to buy or not.
At the same time, friendly companies also called him to ask what was going on.
Only then did Mr. Lei know that it wasn’t just Xiaomi who received such an exaggerated notice.
So, The reason for the incident was not that Xiaomi had offended the big guys.
It was someone else,
So he quickly thought of the Daqin Optics’ delivery of Qin Guang No. 1, which had caused a lot of noise on the Internet two days ago.
”Damn, you gods are fighting, and innocent people are affected…”
Mr. Lei couldn’t help but secretly complain in his heart.
“But fortunately, everyone has raised their prices, and this wave is actually almost the same as no increase!”
”Mr. Lei,” product manager Mai Yongxiang quickly reminded, “Did you forget Huawei…”
”…”
How could Mr. Lei forget such a critical ‘friendly competitor’?
It’s just that I don’t dare to think about it…
”The lithography machine has just been delivered, and their chips should not be mass-produced so quickly…”
”Besides, isn’t it true that their wafer fab can’t buy EUV photoresist now? Maybe the lithography machine they delivered can’t be turned on at all because there is no photoresist…”
”Also, there are so many units and companies waiting to use EUV lithography machines, Huawei may have to queue up…”
”Let’s take a step back. Even if they can make chips, the performance will definitely be much worse than Xiaolong 8gen3. At that time, our price will be a little higher than theirs, which is also reasonable…”
I can only say that Mr. Lei is worthy of being Mr. Lei.
In just a few seconds, he came up with four reasons to comfort himself and his subordinates! Mai Yongxiang hesitated for a moment, but finally couldn’t help asking: “We can’t change the processor, but the CMOS chip actually has a domestic alternative. Why don’t we contact Daqin Optics to see if their CMOS will be sold separately? Last time I tried their camera, the image quality is actually very good.”
”There is no need for this.” Mr. Lei shook his head without thinking:
”After this wave of price increases, the blue and green factories will definitely have to increase prices. It is impossible to sell at a loss…”
”So the original starting price of Xiaomi 14, 3999, must be raised to at least 599 9. ”
”But you sell a mobile phone for 6,000 or 7,000 yuan, but it has a 1200W pixel camera. Do you think anyone will buy it? Moreover, this wave of price increase has already hurt popularity. If you don’t cooperate with Lai Ka, then there will be no basic gimmicks. It is better not to release this new product…”
”The most important thing is that no matter how much coms raises the price, it is only a hundred yuan. I don’t think it is necessary to turn against Lai Ka Soni to save this little money.”
Because Mr. Lei was angry, his tone of voice was very heavy. He almost cursed directly, “Are you a product manager without a brain?”
Mai Yongxiang was naturally a little unhappy when he heard it, but for the sake of his salary, he finally held back and did not refute or explain.
(End of this chapter)