Just turned over a new leaf and became a wise and intelligent student

Chapter 422 Special Talent Introduction
After hanging up the phone, Xu Qingshan shook his head helplessly and sighed.

Senior Wang Xing is good in everything now, except that he is a little childish. He can be considered to have returned to nature. I can only pamper him, after all, he is working for me wholeheartedly.

But the more journals he read and the more he understood the chip industry, the more Xu Qingshan realized his previous concerns about the plan.

There are so many world-leading technologies involved in the complete chip manufacturing process.

During the chip design stage, EDA software tools are used for circuit logic design, physical layout and simulation verification, and an independent hardware description language needs to be developed to concretize the abstract logic into a circuit structure design with nanometer-level precision.

To accomplish this step, one needs top experts in the fields of communications engineering and electronic engineering.

At present, there are almost no talents in the consumer field in China.

Although there are many experts in communications, their research fields are completely different. The chips needed in the domestic focus areas do not need to pay too much attention to size and precision issues.

It's like there are two routes for the same technique, one is to make it smaller and more refined, the other is to make it stronger.

The latter will not be weaker than the former, but will be greatly limited in scene application.

Xu Qingshan is also very clear that most fields in the future will develop in the direction of precision chips. The smaller the size of drones, robot dogs, or other tools equipped with intelligent technology, the more concealed they are.

The most critical part of the manufacturing process, lithography technology, is the most difficult bottleneck to solve.

The EUV lithography machine, which can only be produced in the Netherlands, involves hundreds of thousands of precision parts throughout the entire machine, and the power of the laser plasma light source needs to reach more than 250w.

At present, China does not have the conditions to produce precision fuselage parts, neither the hard conditions nor the talent conditions are met.

Having an EUV lithography machine only means having a hardware preparation platform. It is this hardware equipment platform that plays a decisive role in transistor density and chip performance, and even accounts for more than 30% of the manufacturing cost.

In addition to having a hardware platform, you must also have the corresponding technology. The most commonly used methods in the current global chip manufacturing process are dry etching and wet etching.

The former uses plasma to precisely remove excess material from the surface of the silicon wafer to achieve nanoscale pattern transfer, that is, to transfer the circuit structure designed by EDA to the silicon wafer. The latter uses chemical solutions to process the material structure of silicon photonics, which is mainly used in traditional processes.

The level of domestic wet etching is quite good, but it is a bit embarrassing when it comes to consumer-grade dry etching.

There are talents, but they are not top-notch.

Moreover, those people are currently concentrated in several optical centers in the country and it is difficult to transfer them away.

For this core part, Xu Qingshan may still have to consider doing it himself.

But for other parts, Xu Qingshan has divided them into various blocks and is seeking to introduce special talents according to different technical blocks.

"In order to control the conductive properties of transistors, boron, phosphorus and other ions are injected into silicon wafers to form P/N type semiconductor regions. If you want to accurately control this operation to the atomic level, you can't avoid the supporting facilities of a key laboratory. The basic equipment alone costs tens of millions."

Xu Qingshan rubbed his temples, constantly weighing the technical sectors that he could introduce at present.

"Thin film deposition technology is easier to deal with. Domestic technology is relatively mature and can be used. Chemical mechanical polishing is also easy to solve. Doping and annealing are also OK. We can start with these first."

Xu Qingshan circled two key points on the paper in front of him.

"The technical blockade of packaging and testing is not that serious. Xiaomi can solve this problem. After all, advanced packaging technology ultimately determines only the upper limit of performance. What we need to do now is to ensure that we can make the product and raise the lower limit."

Xu Qingshan currently has a deeper understanding of the chip manufacturing industry.

Chip manufacturing is the pinnacle fusion of precision science and engineering technology. For China at present, photolithography technology is the core bottleneck, while etching, ion implantation, and thin film deposition will constitute the iron triangle of China's chip manufacturing.

As the core supporting technologies for chip manufacturing, the laboratory in Ludao has made certain breakthroughs in single crystal silicon preparation and clean room environment control. The Suntech technology, equipment and patents acquired by Xu Qingshan with Xinlu Investment are not for idle purposes.

However, during the current preparation of single crystal silicon, the purity of the produced single crystal silicon wafers still cannot reach the level that can meet the chip production level.

Fortunately, there are many methods for preparing high-purity single-crystal silicon rods, and Xu Qingshan has not yet focused his research on this aspect, so the semiconductor factory on Ludao can only try to develop some non-core businesses.

But this is equivalent to a fuse. When Xu Qingshan is ready, an excellent single crystal silicon growth method will be able to become the best spark to ignite this chip empire.

Xu Qingshan thought about it and finally picked up the phone and called Zhou Qifeng.

"What? You want to apply for special funds for the introduction of special talents? But hasn't the school already approved your budget for this year? If you want to introduce someone, just go through the process. No one in the school will stop you."

Zhou Qifeng found it a bit strange. After Xu Qingshan signed the contract, Jingcheng University had already given out all the authority that should be given. If they wanted to recruit people, they could just do it directly. Why did Xu Qingshan call him again?
"The budget given before may not be enough. I plan to recruit more people this time, and basically they are world-class scholars. If the conditions are too bad, I am afraid that no matter how good my negotiation is, they will not come."

Xu Qingshan did not immediately tell Zhou Qifeng what he wanted to do, he simply put forward conditions.

"It would be easy if we could recruit people, but the funds we can invest in basic sciences are really limited. Give me a rough number and I'll consider whether I can make the decision."

Zhou Qifeng was also an honest man. Although he felt it was very strange, he told Xu Qingshan his thoughts truthfully.

"The people I want to recruit are not math majors, but engineering majors."

Xu Qingshan kept the secret again.

He wanted to hear Zhou Qifeng's attitude towards his involvement in the chip industry.

"Computers? That's easier to negotiate. Our school's budget for computers is a bit higher this year. If that doesn't work, we can transfer some money from Old Mei. How much do you need?"

"It's not computers. Never mind. I'll just tell you. I'm looking to hire technical experts in the chip industry. I can't tell you the budget. I need to hire a lot of people, so I'll just use as much as I can."

Xu Qingshan told Zhou Qifeng helplessly that if he wanted to recruit people for this matter, he had to report it to his superiors.

"chip?"

Zhou Qifeng was stunned for a moment.

"Why did you suddenly think of getting into chips? There's no news about this at all."

"Have you forgotten where Zhang Ke worked before he joined my lab? And I have invested in a semiconductor factory in Ludao. Even Xiaomi has been doing very well recently. Have you not paid attention to it?"

Xu Qingshan put down the pen in his hand. It would be nice to chat with Lao Zhou and relax his mind a little.

"No, then I wouldn't have thought that you would suddenly want to make chips, right?"

Old Zhou was very surprised.

He did know about chips, but because of this, he was not optimistic about Xu Qingshan's idea. "There aren't many people working on chips and semiconductors in our country right now, right? There's not even a policy from above. I heard last year that some industry funds were being prepared, but the scale was pitifully small."

"90% of our current chips rely on imported technology. If you want to start from scratch, it is too difficult. Even if you have Qingshan Capital, that level of funding cannot support you in making chips."

"Qingshan, I'm not pessimistic about you. It's just that this matter is too complicated. It's not something that can be solved by academic research."

Old Zhou told the truth and tried to persuade Xu Qingshan.

This kind of thing involves international strategy and blockade situation, and there is no way for individuals to challenge it.

"Don't you want to build Qingshan University? It's not easy to build a research institute specializing in basic sciences. There is also a big funding gap."

"Your shop is so extensive now. You need money here and there. I am really worried that something might happen to you. Human energy is limited. You work here and there. Even if you are able to meet the demands, can your body handle it?"

What Lao Zhou said was true, and he really cared about Xu Qingshan.

But what Xu Qingshan knows better is that the shortcomings in manufacturing and materials related to the current domestic chip industry are too obvious. Wafer manufacturing almost entirely relies on imported equipment, and even the 28-nanometer process technology has not yet been broken through. The localization rate in the materials field is less than 20%, and key materials such as photoresist are almost entirely imported.

Almost all upstream technologies are monopolized by Europe and the United States, while the domestic share of the final packaging and testing links does not exceed 30%.

Chips, such an important industry, are completely controlled by others. Local companies will not be able to reap the dividends of the future consumer electronics market.

Although China caught up later, the economic benefits lost by China during that lost golden decade may have exceeded one trillion yuan, according to a non-conservative estimate.

With economic losses of hundreds of billions every year, how much blood and sweat would it take to catch up?
No matter how difficult this matter is, Xu Qingshan would like to give it a try as long as he has the ability and foundation.

From introducing special talents from overseas to designing complete talent training programs at home, from theory to innovation and then to practice, he will lay the foundation of China's science and technology step by step.

We will first pursue quantity, then break through to a talent upgrade war to compete with the world, and use practical training to break the dilemma of paper talk, so that Chinese technology will no longer be developed in isolation and can successfully compete for the dominance of the future technological world.

"Principal, I know what you're worried about, and I understand what you mean, but since we now have the possibility to do it, I won't let go of this opportunity."

Xu Qingshan said firmly.

"I have been preparing for the acquisition of Liangxi Suntech, the early layout of semiconductor material manufacturing, and the integration of Xiaomi's mobile phone industry chain. Now that Peking University has given me this treatment and this opportunity, and I am qualified to try it, I must give it a try."

Zhou Qifeng on the other end of the phone was silent for a long time.

"But."

Zhou Qifeng sighed deeply, and with just this one sigh, Xu Qingshan felt that he seemed to have aged a lot.

"But do you know that if you really want to go down this path now, your identity will become more and more sensitive?"

"sensitive?"

Xu Qingshan frowned, not quite understanding what Zhou Qifeng said.

"Ugh"

Zhou Qifeng began to explain to Xu Qingshan.

"Whether it's your current identity or even your ancestral home, this matter is actually very sensitive."

"I wonder if you have heard about the Hanxin incident a few years ago?"

Xu Qingshan really didn't understand.

"No, the Hanxin incident?"

"Ah."

Zhou Qifeng said slowly.

"In 2003, Chen Jin, the dean of the Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Microelectronics, your fellow villager, also from Minyue, single-handedly led the Hanxin No. 1 fraud incident, and used Hanxin No. to apply for dozens of scientific research projects and defrauded hundreds of millions of scientific research funds. You are also very clear that or million at that time was much more valuable than it is now."

What Zhou Qifeng talked about was the dark history of China's chips.

Xu Qingshan did not comment, but listened to Zhou Qifeng continue preaching.

"When we first started working on Hanxin, there was a lot of enthusiasm in China and people highly respected Chen Jin."

"He turned tens of thousands of yuan into tens of millions in just one and a half years, and this is only part of it."

"After the fraud incident broke out, similar situations became very sensitive, because for the domestic technology circle at the time, Chen Jin was the trinity of technology legends. To some extent, he was as popular as you."

"Because of this incident, the authorities have been very cautious about major achievements in the chip industry until now."

"If you propose to switch to chips at this time, it is likely to touch some points."

Zhou Qifeng continued to persuade earnestly.

"You don't need to take that risk now. You have much more money than Chen Jin, and your status will be higher than his. As long as we do our scientific research well, even if you want to build Qingshan University, we will fully support you. There is really no need to get involved in this muddy water."

Xu Qingshan was silent.

He didn't know these things before.

But even though there are difficulties of all kinds, Xu Qingshan does not intend to give up his ideal of making chips.

There are some things that have to be done by someone, and the sooner you do it, the more advantage you gain.

You will be less exploited by others.

"Principal Zhou, I understand what you mean, but I still have to do it."

"We had nothing back then, but our predecessors were able to make an atomic bomb. Why can't we make a chip?"

(End of this chapter)