Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

CTOnews.com, December 11, Japanese semiconductor company Rapidus recently cooperated with IMEC, the largest chip research and development institution in Europe, showing that the company is promoting the research and development and production of advanced semiconductor technology. Rapidus plans to mass-produce 2nm semiconductors by 2025 and improved 2nm + ultra-fine semiconductors by 2027.

It is reported that Rapidus is a high-end chip company jointly invested by eight Japanese giants, including Toyota, Sony, Kaixia, NTT, Denso, NFC, Mitsubishi and Softbank Corp., and received a subsidy of 70 billion yen (about 3.577 billion yuan) from the Japanese government at that time.

CTOnews.com learned that Rapidus comes from Latin, meaning "fast", and Rapidus mainly aims to mass-produce advanced semiconductors below 2nm that are not yet in practical use around the world.

The MOU was signed by Japanese Minister of economy, Trade and Industry Yasujun Nishimura, Minister of Foreign Policy, Culture, Digitalization and facilities of Belgium, Atsuyoshi Koike, President and CEO of Rapidus, and Luc Van den hove, President and CEO of IMEC.

Rapidus plans to mass-produce 2nm chips in Japan in the second half of the 1920s, which will be used in areas such as 5G communications, quantum computing, data centers, self-driving cars and digital smart cities. IMEC intends to support Rapidus in the research and development of cutting-edge technologies.

To this end, the two sides expressed their intention to establish a strategic partnership in which Rapidus will become the core partner of IMEC's advanced nanoelectronics project, and the MOU also mentions cooperation with the soon-to-be established Center for Frontier Semiconductor Technology (LSTC), which will serve as the R & D center for Japan's next 2 nanotechnologies.

Atsuyoshi Koike, president of Rapidus, admits that Japan is 10 to 20 years behind in cutting-edge technology nodes, and it will not be easy to turn things around, according to the Nikkei News.

According to Japan's Ministry of economy, Trade and Industry (METI), Imec and Rapidus plan to carry out bilateral projects on key technologies such as EUV lithography, and Rapidus may send engineers to Imec for training. Imec, in turn, is willing to consider setting up an R & D team in Japan to develop a long-term roadmap. In addition, according to METI, Imec and Rapidus will consider further cooperation with the upcoming Frontier Semiconductor Technology Center (LSTC).

It is reported that LSTC is a technology center hatched after the United States and Japan reached agreement on the basic principles of semiconductor cooperation at the first meeting of the Japan-US Business and Industrial Partnership (JUCIP) in May. LSTC plans to serve as a research and development base, while Rapidus will serve as a mass production base.

Koike said Rapidus will not seek to catch up with TSMC and Samsung in terms of production scale, but will explore a different business model that focuses on rapid production, according to the Nikkei News.

According to the METI document, Rapidus will acquire the basic technology of the 2nm process in fiscal year 2022 and begin to install EUV lithography equipment, develop specifications for the equipment, transmission system and production management system required for the short turnaround time (TAT) production system, and deploy the initial design of the test line.

Welcome to subscribe "Shulou Technology Information " to get latest news, interesting things and hot topics in the IT industry, and controls the hottest and latest Internet news, technology news and IT industry trends.