Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry announced today that export restrictions on 23 semiconductor manufacturing technologies will come into effect on July 23. The Central News Agency said that this measure is considered to be Japan’s follow-up to the United States‘ actions to strengthen restrictions on the CCP’s access to key semiconductor manufacturing technologies.
The Ministry of Commerce of the Communist Party of China stated today that Japan’s move is an abuse of export control measures and a serious departure from free trade and international economic and trade rules. China firmly opposes this.
The Ministry of Commerce of the Communist Party of China also pointed out that the measures announced by the Japanese side will “seriously damage the interests of Chinese and Japanese companies, seriously damage the Sino-Japanese economic and trade cooperation, disrupt the global semiconductor industry structure, and impact the security and stability of the industrial chain and supply chain.” The right to take action is reserved.
When Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry announced on March 31 this year that it would revise the export control measures of the Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Law, it stated that “it is fulfilling its responsibilities as a technological country, that is, contributing to international peace and stability.” And pointed out that the purpose of control is to prevent advanced technology from being used for military purposes.
The “New York Times” recently reported that the Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Communist Party of China had released the “Catalogue of Technologies Prohibited and Restricted from Exporting in China” as early as August 2020. Also cured himself.
The Biden administration announced the most comprehensive chip export control measures against China in early October last year, and successfully persuaded the Netherlands and Japan to jointly control the export of Chinese semiconductors.
Dr. Xu Wenfu, former convener of the science and technology group of the Taiwan Professors Association and market consultant of the French power system manufacturer SAFT, pointed out to Voice of America that the production equipment of semiconductor chip factories in the world mainly comes from three countries, the first is the United States, and the second is The Netherlands, and the third is Japan. These three countries jointly prohibit the export of advanced process equipment to China, which has great strategic significance. He said: “China’s full investment in funds has also allowed China’s semiconductors to grow from zero to one-third of the current level. Advanced equipment. Therefore, China is indeed facing an insurmountable challenge in developing advanced manufacturing processes. Even if all of China devotes all of its efforts, it will be difficult to develop this kind of equipment in a short period of time.”
According to the technology website “Tom’s Hardware”, the US government’s latest export controls prohibit the export of production equipment related to logic chips below 14nm, Dram below 18nm, and Flash memory above 128 layers to China.
China expert and historian Dr. Zhang Tianliang pointed out in his latest video program that the chip ban in Western countries has prevented companies such as SMIC and Yangtze Memory from obtaining equipment for manufacturing high-end chips. SMIC has deleted the 14nm process from its official website and will no longer accept related orders. This not only marks the unfinished project of the CCP’s large-scale chip refining project, but also means that the technology gap between the CCP and Western countries will become wider and wider.