Major forum to highlight China’s role in global chip supply chain

Eastern China’s Anhui province, home to more than 400 companies that form part of the domestic semiconductor industry, is looking to highlight the country’s role in the global chip supply chain, as it hosts the 2022 World Conference on Integrated Circuits this week.

The conference, which started on Wednesday and concludes this Friday in the provincial capital of Hefei, is jointly organised by the Anhui government and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. More than 200 speakers from the global semiconductor industry are expected to take part in the three-day event.

This marks the first time that another mainland city is hosting the event, known previously as IC China and held in Shanghai from 2018 to 2020.

It also reflects the steady progress of Anhui’s integrated circuit (IC) sector, which includes chip maker ChangXin Memory Technologies, as the provincial government expands its support of local firms.

Overall revenue from Anhui’s semiconductor industry is expected to surpass 500 billion yuan (US$70.93 billion) this year, up 25 per cent from a year ago, while projects with total investments of 300 billion yuan are now under development, according to estimates announced last week by Anhui government official Ke Wenbing.

Initiatives to boost local investment in Anhui’s chip sector are expected to be announced at the 2022 World Conference on Integrated Circuits.

At least 50 semiconductor companies in Anhui each have more than 100 million yuan in annual revenue. These include firms in chip design, wafer manufacturing, packaging and testing, as well as chip materials and equipment, according to the province’s official data.

At present, Shanghai is considered China’s semiconductor highland, with the city now accounting for one quarter of the country’s IC value output and 40 per cent of the country’s chip talent.

But other local governments across the country have been doubling down on cash incentives and policy support for home-grown semiconductor companies, bolstering China’s drive for greater self-sufficiency in the chip sector amid a heightened tech war with the US. These include Shenzhen, Beijing, Nanjing, Wuxi, Hefei and Xian and Wuhan.

At the conference, organisers and participants are also expected to focus on strengthened international cooperation in the semiconductor industry.

That is in stark contrast to Washington’s move last month to expand the scope of US hi-tech export controls targeted at chip makers on the mainland, which followed the Biden administration’s enactment of the Chips and Science Act in August to boost America’s production of integrated circuits.

Meanwhile, China’s IC output in October contracted by 26.7 per cent from a year ago, marking the biggest monthly decline on record for the domestic semiconductor industry, amid weak demand that mirrored the country’s first export growth decrease in more than two years. South China Morning Post