The growth of 5G data scale will help the semiconductor industry innovate and upgrade

Currently, 5G is entering a period of accelerated development. 5G will penetrate into all walks of life, further solve the problem of connecting things to things, and promote the digital transformation of the industry. The communications industry develops a generation every 10 years. Compared with previous communication technologies, 5G business requirements have changed significantly, which also poses new challenges to communication chips.

First, due to the rapid growth of data volume, improving computing power has become a top priority for the development of 5G. The perception layer of 5G massive IoT, the increase in connection rate and the reduction in latency will greatly drive the growth of data volume. Therefore, in addition to having communication functions, communication chips also need to have powerful computing capabilities to meet the needs of profound changes in network architecture under cloud-network integration.

Secondly, the complexity of chip design is increasing. 5G uses complex coding to improve spectrum utilization, and multiple channels, high frequencies, and large bandwidths jointly promote the increase in data throughput. 5G's diverse application scenarios and the demand for low power consumption make chip design very complex.

Finally, benefiting from 5G networks, high-performance processors and optical devices for edge computing have broad development prospects, but the domestic chip supply chain is still insufficient, and there is still a large gap between China and foreign companies in terms of industrial-scale commercial use and product performance.

Challenges and opportunities coexist. While 5G development brings challenges, it also promotes the innovation and progress of domestic semiconductors.

Semiconductor Technology Innovation and Development Trends

The huge storage market demand brought by 5G has made China the world's largest semiconductor consumer market. The semiconductor industry is the core supporting industry of my country's science and technology, and gallium nitride (GaN) electronic devices with high power density, high efficiency and low power consumption are called the core of "third-generation semiconductors" and are the key elements for realizing 5G communications and the Internet of Everything.

The third-generation semiconductor technology has outstanding advantages in thermal conductivity, radiation resistance, breakdown electric field, electron saturation rate, etc. It is the "core" of solid-state light sources, power electronics, and microwave radio frequency devices. It has broad application prospects in semiconductor lighting, new generation mobile communications, new energy grid connection, smart grid, high-speed rail transit, new energy vehicles and other fields.

The global third-generation semiconductor industry is dominated by the United States, Japan, and Europe. Among them, the United States has a relatively complete industrial chain, especially in the field of silicon carbide, where the United States is the world's leading company. The main advantages of the European Union are concentrated in the epitaxial link, substrate, and device links. Japan leads in equipment and module development.

There is still a large gap between my country and developed countries such as the United States, Europe, and Japan in the first and second generation semiconductor technologies. However, after a decade of hard work, the gap between my country and these countries in the third generation semiconductors is relatively small. At the same time, the domestic market capacity is large, and the prospects for third generation semiconductor technology are promising.

Gallium nitride is a wide bandgap compound semiconductor that is relatively new to commercial applications. Its power efficiency, power density, and ability to handle a wider frequency range make it very suitable for massive MIMO base stations. Gallium nitride has some good properties that can better support lightweight electronic products.

●High breakdown electric field strength. This greatly improves the current density and withstand voltage capacity of the device and reduces conduction loss.

● Wide band gap and large forbidden band width. This means that GaN can be used in high-power applications.

●High thermal conductivity. Gallium nitride has excellent heat dissipation performance, and its device integration and power density are higher than traditional components.

●The electron saturation drift speed is fast and can work at a higher frequency.

●The dielectric constant is small, which can reduce the leakage current of integrated circuits and reduce the capacitance effect between wires.

●Stable chemical properties.

●High hardness.

Policy support promotes domestic industry prosperity

The country has provided continuous policy support for the development of the third-generation semiconductor industry. As early as 2016, the State Council issued the "Notice on the 13th Five-Year National Science and Technology Innovation Plan", which mentioned for the first time the need to accelerate the research and development of third-generation semiconductor chip technology and devices; in June 2019, the Ministry of Commerce and the National Development and Reform Commission added support for the introduction of SiC ultrafine powder foreign companies to the list of encouraged foreign investment; in November 2019, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the "Guidelines for the First Batch of Application Demonstration of Key New Materials", in which GaN single crystal substrates, GaN epitaxial wafers for power devices, SiC epitaxial wafers, SiC single crystal substrates and other third-generation semiconductor products were included in the catalog; in December 2019, the State Council clearly required in the "Outline of the Integrated Development Plan for the Yangtze River Delta Region" to accelerate the cultivation and layout of the third-generation semiconductor industry and promote the high-quality development of the manufacturing industry.

With policy support, the domestic semiconductor industry continues to develop. At present, my country has formed a number of third-generation semiconductor industry clusters, including the Yangtze River Delta, the Pearl River Delta, the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, and the Fujian Triangle. In particular, the Yangtze River Delta and the Pearl River Delta are relatively strong, becoming my country's two major national third-generation semiconductor technology innovation centers.

Taking Jiangsu Province as an example, Jiangsu Province’s “14th Five-Year Plan” has made third-generation semiconductors a key layout focus, and has cultivated many outstanding companies such as Nanotech, Innoscience, China Science and Technology Hanyun, Huarui Micro Integrated Circuit, and Suzhou Enxun High-Energy Semiconductor.

In the Pearl River Delta, third-generation semiconductor technology is also a focus of Guangdong's "14th Five-Year Plan". Guangdong Province has clearly stated that it will set up a semiconductor and integrated circuit industry investment fund with an initial scale of 20 billion yuan to support technological innovation in the semiconductor and integrated circuit fields and create a 200 billion chip design industry cluster with Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Zhuhai as the core. Among them, Shenzhen, as a national third-generation semiconductor technology innovation center, has currently established a number of important platforms such as the third-generation semiconductor device key laboratory, becoming a domestic semiconductor product sales, distribution and design center.