'Former ASMI has been focusing on technology research and development, but since last year, the company has adjusted its market strategy and started to strengthen market expansion and customer service. Therefore, we expect ASMI to achieve three times the market sales performance in the Chinese market in 2018.' Xu Wei, director of ASMI China Business Development, said during an interview with Micronet reporter during SEMICON China.
In fact, there are two famous equipment suppliers in the global semiconductor equipment industry with the name ASM, namely ASMI and ASM PT. Currently, they are all listed companies. According to Micronet, the two companies were established by the same founder. ASMI and ASMPT are currently operating independently. ASMI is mainly responsible for the previous process, and ASMPT is the main process for the latter stage. The only relationship between the two is that ASMI is the largest shareholder of ASMPT and the former holds 25% of the latter's shares.
Founded in the Netherlands in 1968, ASMI is one of the world’s top ten equipment suppliers. Currently, ASMI has R&D centers and production bases in 7 countries around the world, with 1900 employees. ASMI China is headquartered in Shanghai and is located in the country. Local locations with service and support, as well as local process engineering support for advanced technology research and development. At the same time, the company also stores parts locally to ensure that it can quickly serve customers' needs.
Has its own process integration center
According to Xu, the biggest advantage of ASMI is the ALD process, and ASMI is also the world's largest supplier of ALD process equipment. According to published data, ALD equipment is an indispensable thin film deposition equipment for advanced integrated circuit manufacturing processes. The ALD process has the advantages of low process temperature, precise film thickness control and high step coverage.
ASMI currently cooperates with many Chinese chip makers and has installed a number of devices from less than 200mm to 300mm. Oriented applications include logic/fab, storage and analog manufacturing, and wafer market. In China, it has been used The production platforms include Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD), Enhanced Plasma Chemical Vapor Deposition (PECVD), Vertical Furnace, and Epitaxy.
It is reported that ASMI not only has R&D centers in Korea, Japan and the United States, but also has R&D centers in Belgium and Finland respectively. At the same time, Xu Lai said, 'The biggest difference between us and other equipment factories lies in: ASMI has its own process integration center. (Belgium). When we are doing advanced process research, we will find some applications. After discovering the application, we will need the relevant materials, and then feedback to us at the material research center in Finland to study the corresponding material support process. Finally, Feedback to the business unit to manufacture equipment according to requirements, provide to customers, and then update the equipment according to customer needs.
Optimistic about the growth of the future Chinese market
According to the latest content of the SEMI (International Semiconductor Industry Association)'s "Worldwide Fab Forecast Report" published on February 28, 2018, the global Fab equipment spending will increase by 5% in 2019, showing a fourth consecutive year of significant growth. Unless the original plan is drastically changed, China will be the main driver for the growth of equipment spending for global fabs in 2018 and 2019.
SEMI predicts that global fab equipment spending will be topped by Samsung in 2018 and 2019, but the investment amount is not as high as 2017. In contrast, in order to support multinational and local wafer fab programs, China will have 2018 Fab fab equipment spending will increase significantly by 57% from the previous year and by as much as 60% in 2019. The spending on equipment in mainland China is expected to surpass South Korea in 2019 and become the world’s highest expenditure area.
'Because of the strong growth performance of the Chinese market, ASMI has made a lot of changes since last year to strengthen market expansion and customer service. 'Xu Lai said, 'Actually, ASMI has been in China for 20 years, so far in China. The installed capacity is about 200, covering all customers in China. Now Chongqing, Xuzhou, Guangzhou, Qingdao and other places have new customers, so the corresponding team also has to continue to expand.
Xu La believes that 'ASMI has received a lot of recognition around the world and is the best supplier for Intel and TSMC. With the increase of China's business in the future, we believe that we will get more domestic customers' recognition in China.'