Reporter: Shaohui Shao, Shanghai Report
According to Todd Edlund, executive vice president and chief operating officer of Entegris, a provider of specialty chemical and advanced materials solutions in the United States, globalization is one of the most important trends in the semiconductor industry in the past decades. This trend is continuing. In terms of material supply, Asia has become the most important growth area for the semiconductor industry compared to Europe and the United States.
Compared to other companies included in the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOX), Entegris is somewhat different: it is neither a semiconductor manufacturer nor an equipment manufacturer, but supplies special chemicals and advanced material processing solutions for semiconductor production.
'We can provide services across the entire semiconductor industry. The growth of any part of this industry is good for us.' Edlund told reporters in the 21st Century Business Herald in an exclusive interview, 'In the past few decades, the semiconductor industry has expanded to the world, We also expanded to a global scope.
The 21st Century Business Herald reporter learned that Entegris is building the Entegris China Technology Center in Shanghai and is expected to complete operations by the end of 2018.
Technological Innovation Drives the Semiconductor Industry into an Era of Globalization
"21st Century": In the past 20 years, the global semiconductor industry has undergone major changes. Japanese companies have declined, and American companies have firmly taken absolute advantage. How do you view this?
Edlund: I have been in this industry for 23 years. During this period, the semiconductor industry has been continuously evolving and changing. At the beginning of my career, the equipment manufacturers in the United States and Japan were very strong and continued to this day, but equipment manufacturers in other regions are also Growth, such as South Korea, Taiwan and China, China. At the same time, semiconductor manufacturers have also begun to global layout. For example, Intel now has factories in China, Ireland and Israel, and so on. The manufacturers of South Korea and China Taiwan are also the same, such as TSMC and South Korean storage companies have already built factories in mainland China. The entire semiconductor industry has been shifting to regions with strong demand growth globally. Asia, especially China’s economic growth, has led to strong demand for semiconductors, both from exports of electronic products. , It is also the demand of the domestic market. This has also become one of the reasons why China wants to build its own IC industry.
When I first joined, Entegris was also a private company called Fluoroware. There are only factories in Japan and the United States. Today, we have a large factory in Malaysia that can supply the entire Asian region. Through acquisitions and investment in new buildings, we set up in South Korea and Taiwan, China. Factory. Now, we cooperate with Fujian Bochun Materials Co., Ltd. and Hubei Jingxing Technology Co., Ltd., and we have two factories in mainland China.
"21st Century": The rise of the Internet has profoundly affected the development of the semiconductor industry. What has been the impact of Entegris as a material supplier?
Edlund: Influenced by the Internet and mobile networks, the semiconductor industry has grown from a 'small industry' that specializes in providing components for the computer industry to a diverse industry that now supports a variety of complex technological applications. Nowadays, the Internet of Things, you can Acquire, process, upload, and even perform these operations in a car. These interconnected trends truly drive the demand for new semiconductors globally, bringing the semiconductor industry to the international stage. Therefore, Entegris It must also grow into an international company. We have invested in this globally.
"21st Century": Some people think that now is the 'fourth science and technology revolution'. What are the emerging frontier technologies such as 5G, AI, and the Internet of Things, which have affected the semiconductor industry and material manufacturers?
Edlund: On two fronts, the first is to continuously drive the demand for cutting-edge semiconductor technology—put more computing power into smaller chips and consume less power. In addition, this drives more complex and high-performance. The demand for memory, such as flash memory for 3D architectures. Naturally, this means that for compound materials, the need for pollution control, we will also benefit from it.
On the other hand, the Internet of Things and other sensing and communications equipment have, to some extent, contributed to the recovery of some of the past mainstream semiconductors. For example, 200mm wafers are actually previous generation products, but today many new ones represented by the Internet of Things The application equipment is based on 200mm wafers. Wafer manufacturers need to increase the production capacity of this type of product. This drives us to re-use the past 'legacy', and these businesses that have been put into use decades ago have started to grow again. .
"21st Century": In recent years, frequent mergers and acquisitions in the semiconductor industry, the industry consolidation trend is obvious. As a material supplier Entegris has also made several important acquisitions. What is the connection between this?
Edlund: In the past 15 years, the semiconductor industry has experienced many mergers and acquisitions integration, which all stem from the growth of the industry. Today, there are 5-10 very large semiconductor manufacturers in the industry, which are expanding globally. If we only A small material manufacturer will be hard to provide services for these giants and their industries all over the world. Therefore, this kind of M&A integration also spreads to the supplier side, including equipment manufacturers and material manufacturers. In addition to expanding the scale of production, we also The types of solutions needed to be broadened to provide customers with more targeted services. They do not need to deal with 10 different companies for 10 different services, and the Entegris family is enough. As a 52-year-old enterprise We still need to constantly adapt to the development and change of the industry.
Willing to strengthen cooperation with Chinese manufacturers
"21st Century": China has been devoting itself to the development of integrated circuit (IC) industry in recent years, but there is still a big gap between the cutting-edge field and international mainstream manufacturers. How do you see the current status and future of China's IC industry?
Edlund: The development of the integrated circuit industry cannot be accomplished overnight. China has performed very well. Taking China's breakthrough 28nm process process as an example, from a global perspective, this is still very difficult to grasp the cutting-edge technology not long ago. Chinese companies can and other Companies in the region that have viable, advanced process processes collaborate, such as Entegris. We can help with the increase in yield, which is often the biggest challenge for IC wafer manufacturing.
"21st Century": Does this mean a good opportunity for Entegris? What are the plans for this?
Edlund: This is undoubtedly a very good opportunity. I am very looking forward to the development of China's IC industry. It takes many years to cultivate such a high-tech industry, but China has enough determination, which is beneficial to the entire Chinese economy. In order to do this, we need to have the corresponding local production capacity, just as we did before in Taiwan, Korea, and the United States. We also need to have the ability to work effectively with local Chinese customers to help them apply our Products, Selecting the right solution to increase yield and control pollution. To this end, we invested in a cooperative factory in China and are building a China Technology Center.
"21st Century": Entegris has R&D centers and factories in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. What are the specific layouts and plans in China?
Edlund: We have a technology center in Taiwan, South Korea and Japan. We will soon have a technology center in mainland China. After years of development, the technical centers in South Korea and Taiwan have become quite large. We hope to go through the local technology center. To enable customers to participate in cooperation with us, so that the scale of China's technology center will gradually increase. In terms of factories, generally speaking, the increase in production can reduce production costs, and closer to customers can reduce transportation costs. Customers will want to be optimal. To get the best solution for the price, we need to make trade-offs between increasing the capacity of existing plants and selecting new plants. At present, our two co-operation plants in China have been able to provide customers with quality solutions and prices. The best product, but this is just the beginning. We will look for more business growth points in China and judge whether we need to produce in the local area. In my opinion, we will definitely continue to promote in China in the next few years. The production capacity.
"21st Century": What do you think China Taiwan and the mainland have become the largest and fastest-growing consumer markets for semiconductor materials?
Edlund: Consistent with the factors driving the growth of the global semiconductor market. In the past mainly computers, smart phones and other communications equipment are becoming a bigger driver. Foundry business has grown significantly in the past period of time, China Taiwan It is to achieve rapid development. Many devices are currently assembled in China, which requires a large amount of semiconductors. China is developing a very diverse semiconductor industry, from foundry to equipment production, to logic devices, and storage. Etc. to provide semiconductors for different industries.
"21st Century": The storage-related business accounts for 1/3 of Entegris's revenue. Storage vendors are mainly in Asia, but the industry has concerns that the market will be cold. What do you think about this?
Edlund: Automated driving that requires data collection, artificial intelligence, Internet of Things, home automation, etc. are all driving the growth of the storage market. We need to store large amounts of data collected by sensors. Therefore, storage companies are accelerating investment expansion to address Expected growth. There will be short-term fluctuations among these, but in the long term, the storage market will continue to maintain rapid growth. In addition, we have 2/3 of revenue from other customer businesses, including logic devices, wafers Foundry, almost all semiconductor production will use our products, even if the storage market slows down, our revenue can also be guaranteed.