Russian Electronics: Semiconductor and Processors

I already talked about this here before Mapper llc was based in the Netherlands. The Russian part of the operation basically made the write heads.
Mapper llc was sold to ASML. The Russian operation, which was owned by Rusnano, was split off from Mapper llc, because the Russian government would not allow their property to be divested like that. Mapper llc inside ASML is now supposed to use that same technology to make wafer inspection tools. Instead of being used for writing to the wafers.

The write heads are made with MEMS technology and the factory in Russia is still up. See the link below.
https://mapperllc.ru/

But AFAIK the effort make make this technology in Russia has stalled. The factory now makes products for other companies using a fab model.

the military and space don't use chips like this much - re radiation issues

but you would think that any major co-operation between Russia and China would be via the militaries
ie buried out of site

there's no way they would make it visible in the commercial sphere
as its a geostrategic issue

so I think you may well find 28nm type chips arriving in Russia via the military even though they aren't big users of them

seems weird ... but that's what I would do

kvs wrote:For sure there is no PR about strategic tech in Russia and we have no blogging about China-Russia collaboration.

But space hardened ICs are lower resolution than the CPUs everyone fixates on.   These ICs have deliberate design
features to siphon off ionization induced charging and currents by having more metal traces.   360 nm and higher
process resolution is almost mandatory for radiation hardened ICs.   The Shuttle used Intel 960 processors which
date back to the 1980s.   They did the job were coarse enough to deal with radiation.  

BTW, there is no magic shielding for space electronics.   There is a wide spectrum of energy of incoming particles
such as galactic cosmic rays (GCR) which are nucleons with energies in the tens of gigaelectronvolts.   The Sun
pumps out surges of protons with energies in the range of tens to hundreds of megaelectronvolts.   The LEO orbits
also have exposure to a accelerated electrons from the Earth's magnetotail which have energies up to a few
megaelectronvolts.    A lot of particles just transit through orbiting devices such as the ISS regardless of the
fact that they are charged.   Nobody has 10 meter thick lead shields or magnetic shields in any orbiting device.

 

Majority of the chips made for Russia's space and military forces in the nuclear field are around 180nm from my understanding.  To which they had mass production capabilities of such for well over a decade. The best they can do for server grade for now will be 65nm until they build these Lithography machines.

kvs wrote:I think in 5 years Russia will have its own EUV and X-ray lithography equipment.   My strong impression is that the necessary
tech development for such devices has been the focus over the last 20 years.   Russia is not starting from scratch.   I would
not be so dismissive of the Mapper Lithography tech.   AMSL may not find a use for it but that is not a constraint on Russia.

I dont take what random people say on the internet in seriousness. When the professionals in the universities who have experience with this tech (many of whom were from soviet era btw still working as professors and researchers), along with major institutions looking at it along with the Ministry of Industry and trade (who sanctioned PD-14 as an example long before and they were relying on French tech), I would say they have a good idea. Especially since they have Planar working on it with the Russian teams as Planar made the previous lithography equipment during Soviet times, around 1985 or so.

Some people are skeptics and nothing wrong with that. But as GarryB said, it was made by hand by someone before hand, doesn't mean its exclusive to just that people. Using China as an example of how they are still behind isn't necessarily a good example as China has a long history of copying but not really inventing. Not saying they aren't smart because they are, but they still import a lot of tech or equipment for a good reason.

Anyway, its all assumptions till the time comes, right?

if they are really looking at 4-5 years
wouldn't you go for the x-ray spectrum and skip UV spectrums altogether

maybe that is where they are co-operating with China
China already seems fairly advanced with UV already

a good example as China has a long history of copying but not really inventing.

Not true at all, there are large numbers of things the Chinese invented, and many things they copied and also improved, but when you adopt someone elses product you have to be very careful if you modify it because modifications can break the design because it was not intended to be used that way.

Fundamental changes can require the design to be fully retested to make sure the design is not broken by the changes, and if you are copying to get it into service quickly then it makes no sense to make any radical changes that might break the design.

If you want to see simple design look up the forgotton weapons videos on the PPSh-41 and the PPS-43 Sub machine guns. Even the videos on the DP-27 LMG show very simplified design mechanism, or the Tokarev rifle from WWII, all very basic simple designs.

This new technology the Russians are working on sound excellent and should be very useful for Russia and any potential customer that might want to buy that technology especially if it means chip production can be more widespread... of course designing chips is a skill as well...

thanks for that
I was just wondering whether Rus has a lot of ex-Soviet stuff on the x-ray spectrum ... so why not use that

I agree re uselessness of idiotically small nm stuff

was just thinking Rus launched that telescope
Spektr-RG recently mapping the universe in the x-ray spectrum

they seem pretty comfortable with x-rays

what do you guys make of this ... seems to be saying that this type of setup is less prone to radiation issues ?

Mr Electrobrain at Yandex again ...

https://zen.yandex.ru/media/electromozg/pozitivnye-novosti-iportozamesceniia-mikroelektroniki-v-roskosmose-6231e4944d32b3029bbb72b2?&

"Positive news and port substitution of microelectronics in Roscosmos!"

out of my league ....

yeah having been in corporate life for decades I can tell you it all started going downhill when we moved to the "US Business Model"
this typically involved parasites on short-term 2 yr contracts with a 1 year option
and "performance bonuses"

the easiest way to increase profit during your "contract period" ...... cut costs

so you get these clowns that come in .... gut the company ..... then move on to the next company to gut
with all their "performance bonuses" in the bank ...

after gutting 3-4 companies they retire to the Bahamas with their money buried in offshore accounts
... having created massive mid-term damage to all those companies and being paid "performance bonuses" to do it ?

look at FABless CPU businesses .... same "US business model"
foundries take ages to set up .... well beyond 2-3 year contracts .....
it's much easier to just sell out of the foundry business and focus on short-term bonuses
you can smell it from a million miles away .... classic "US Business Model"

then of course the US then complains about China's "unfair business practices"
where they have the audacity to do long-term planning ....
and horror of horrors retain good workers on long-term contracts ...

the first one they love doing .... sell off the real estate

bonuses are usually based on return on nett assets
so the easiest way to do that is ....
to sell off the assets then rent them back ..... real estate is the easy one
so these parasites sell off the factory .... then rent it back
"hey buddy we ain't in the real estate business ! we are in the manufacturing business !"
nothing really changes .... but a big bonus gets paid

next .... which is what Rogozin is talking correctly about

the scam to move costs from fixed to variable
you move sub-assemblies and component production outside the organisation
(in effect your "factory" next becomes just a glorified final assembly line ...)

then your purchasing dept starts "auctioning off" sub-assembly and component orders to the cheapest supplier
to get their own short-term "performance" bonuses .....

and that is when you start having quality issues ..... lots of them

not to mention supply line issues .....
when you discover that your glorious purchasing dept has found a new cheaper supplier in Lower Botswana
in a factory prone to flooding and crocodile infestations ....

in your rented factory ..... full of accountants and lawyers and no engineers any more .....

so Rogozin is dead right ....

It can be used for three things. Inspection i.e. defect scanning, Mask Writing i.e. making masks for photolithography, or Direct Writing i.e. scanning. Each of those requires progressively more time. Direct Writing being the one that would take the longest.

The whole idea with this is to use electron beams instead of light. The way Dutch Mapper llc got around this throughput problem, i.e. you are basically writing with a pencil instead of using a stamp, was by using MEMS to basically make loads and loads of microscopic write heads. Then you need to have the control hardware and software to control the write heads.

The Japanese already have an inspection tool with electron beam technology. ASML (with ex-Mapper staff) is working on one. And the Chinese also have teams working on making similar tools for inspection and mask writing. But for mass production with direct writing for more than research purposes it is hard to justify. You might get like one chip or two a day with older electron beam technology. Unless you really get those MEMS to work it won't scale to industrial purposes. But if they do manage it, this is the real multi-tool for semiconductor fabrication.

It will never scale to as high volumes as photolithography. But you don't need such high volumes for most military purposes. You might make thousands of tanks or planes, not millions or tens of millions.

Stealthflanker wrote:So apparently Taiwan joined the sanction bandwagon, which directly affects the availability of Baikal and Elbrus processor. Seeing that these processors are used in some latest military hardware of Russia.  Can't help but think that it might slow down production unless substitution is found.  One of the affected product is apparently Su-57's and S-400's. as their respective mission computers are using Elbrus processors.

I wonder tho if they already have enough stocks to produce enough numbers of them until substitution is found.

Please read the thread.

Elbrus 2C+ which is used in both of those are made in Zelenograd.  That is the only known Elbrus that uses DSP cores which is needed for radioelectronic devices in processing data in real time as fast as it can.

Elbrus 4S and later were made at TSMC but low rate production of 65nm can be done at Mikron Plant I'm Zelenograd. But these type of chips are typically 90nm amd higher.

Stealthflanker wrote:So apparently Taiwan joined the sanction bandwagon, which directly affects the availability of Baikal and Elbrus processor. Seeing that these processors are used in some latest military hardware of Russia.  Can't help but think that it might slow down production unless substitution is found.  One of the affected product is apparently Su-57's and S-400's. as their respective mission computers are using Elbrus processors.

I wonder tho if they already have enough stocks to produce enough numbers of them until substitution is found.

Like sepheronx said the Su-57 uses 90nm versions of Elbrus which are made in Russia at Mikron. The larger versions of Elbrus are used in the Russian civilian government for servers. Not in military equipment or even in the military in general. The only chip imports which cannot be made in Russia in Russian military hardware will be the kind that is so common they can easily smuggle. The Russian military has always had a requirement not to be dependent on imports from the West for weapons systems. As for Baikal its main client is civilian applications like set top boxes, civilian government contractors, not even the government itself. So while this is a definite blow to Russia's advanced processor design industry it will have zero impact on the military. Russia has been under sanctions from the West with regards to military grade and even space grade electronics and other imports since 2014. These sanctions so far add nothing new really.

pure oxygen-free copper back in production ....

Goodbye imports: After many years of inactivity, the production of ultra-pure copper for electronics has been restarted in Russia

https://zen.yandex.ru/media/sdelanounas.ru/import-proscai-posle-mnogih-let-prostoia-v-rossii-vnov-zapusceno-proizvodstvo-sverhchistoi-medi-dlia-elektroniki-6259479e84aebe77d9cb4f5b?&

miniaturised gyroscopes etc re Roscosmos

RKS produces components for inertial navigation systems

https://kosmosnews.fr/2022/04/18/rks-produit-des-composants-pour-les-systemes-de-navigation-inertielle/

( I've put them in other threads before but seems appropriate here too )

you can see the trend though
specialised electronics in moderate batch builds are well within Russia's abilities
for space, military, Rosatom etc where 90nm type stuff is preferred re radiation
as they were the major customers for Rus-made electronics

this is interesting
Rus designed and built 4G and 5G basestations are beginning to surface ....
what processors they use ? I don't know

Another Russian cellular base station tested

https://zen.yandex.ru/media/electromozg/ispytana-ocherednaia-rossiiskaia-bazovaia-stanciia-sotovoi-sviazi-6259896097f7a57b7b692951?&

some background reading ...

"The 3.4-3.8GHz range is widely popular for 5G technology, with only China and Japan using 4.4-4.99GHz
The 3.4GHz-3.8GHz frequencies are reportedly reserved for military, intelligence and security use. Russia’s Communications Ministry has proposed allocating the 4.4GHz-4.99GHz frequency range for 5G" Kommersant article

so that has delayed 5G Rus launches to some extent being "non-standard" spec .... and waiting for the above decision to be made
... and that has made it possible to then launch 5G on mostly Rus-made basestations as a result ? .... sure reads that way to me ?

seems to also say Rus military have been using "5G" for a longtime ..... lots of experience that can easily translate to commercial applications
and hence an "all Rus" 5G network is a real possibility ?

not my area of expertise .... does seem that is their 5G plan ... all Rus rollout

Producing their own chips will be valuable, they need to develop radiation resistant equipment if they want to visit the moons of Jupiter and Saturn and also operate bases on the Moon of earth because that will be outside the protection of the Earths radiation belt.

Anything they send to Mars will also need protected electronics... with nuclear propulsion light weight is not so critical as radiaton protected would be...

It is also a chance for Russian scientists to make improvements and breakthroughs in basic electronics too which will be interesting too.

Not just improvements in performance but also improvements in production and design... 3D printed chips?

New designs to improve throughput and they way they are integrated into all sorts of hardware that is not a personal computer or phone, but might be a vehicle or other machine.

"March 1, 2021 Designed to survey the Arctic region of the Earth, the first Arktika-M series hydrometeorological satellite was launched into a highly-elliptical orbit (HEO) at 12:15 pm on February 28.

The satellite’s onboard control complex was developed by Moscow Experimental Design Bureau “Mars”, a Rosatom subsidiary.
The control complex will be responsible for the spacecraft’s operation for the next seven years. .....

At present, Moscow Experimental Design Bureau “Mars” is set to develop and manufacture the on-board control systems for three more spacecrafts in the Arktika-M series in the framework of Russia’s federal space programme.

For reference:

The Arktika-M satellite was developed by the S.А. Lavochkin Scientific and Production Association, a subsidiary of Russia’s space agency Roscosmos. The satellite is part of the high-elliptical hydrometeorological space system (VGKS) – an orbital constellation that consists of up to four spacecrafts. VGKS is designed to achieve the following tasks: to obtain and preliminarily process multispectral images of cloudiness and of Earth’s underlying surface across the entirety of the observable Arctic region; to obtain heliogeophysical data at a highly-elliptical orbit (HEO) "

https://rosatom-asia.com/press-centre/news/rosatom-participates-in-launch-of-first-arktika-m-meteorological-satellite/

Lavochkin does all the deep space stuff - how long have they worked with Rosatom ? nfi

... what else is Rosatom up to in electronics ? I suspect quite a lot

Homegrown silicon. Will Russia be able to do without imported microchips?, by Vladislav Strekopytov for RIA Novosti. 21.04.2022.

Due to Western sanctions, the Russian microelectronics industry is in a difficult situation: leading manufacturers have stopped deliveries of components and equipment, and the prospects for importing finished products are unclear. About whether it is realistic to cope on their own - in the material of RIA Novosti.

"Blood of the global economy"

The Soviet Union was one of the leaders in microelectronics. The technological level made it possible to make not only the world's best rockets, aircraft, submarines, but also household electronic devices. In 1974, the first microprocessor appeared, in 1979, a microcomputer, and in 1985, the Elektronika-85 personal computer. But in the 1990s, this industry in the country fell into decline, and world technologies, on the contrary, took a step forward. By the early 2000s, a global market with a turnover of hundreds of billions of dollars had formed.

Now semiconductors are called "the blood of the global economy." Microchips created on their basis are the most important elements of any electronic device. The production of modern-day materials is such a complex and costly process that not a single state, including the United States and China , is able to localize full-cycle production.

The world has developed an international division of labor - a kind of ecosystem, which includes hundreds of suppliers from different countries. Many enterprises occupy a monopoly position. Thus, almost all manufacturers of integrated circuits buy photolithographic installations from the Dutch company ASML. A serious failure in the circuit was caused by a recent shutdown due to the tightening of environmental requirements of the 3M plant in Belgium : it provided up to 80 percent of the world's need for coolant for etching silicon wafers.

There are also only three undoubted leaders in the production of final products - chips and processors - Taiwanese TSMC, Korean Samsung Electronics and American Intel.

"The creation of chips with a resolution of 9-15 nanometers is provided by the resources and developments of almost the whole world. This requires ultra-high purity inert gases, single-crystal silicon, appropriate laser sources and high-precision positioning technologies, equipment for technical control, and much more," says Associate Professor of the Department of Automation and telemechanics of the Perm Polytechnic University (PNRPU), Ph.D. short term".

The closest thing to solving this problem came China, which 20 years ago headed for import substitution in the field of microelectronics. Today, the Chinese SMIC factory, despite huge investments, has only reached the 14nm technology level that leading manufacturers achieved in 2015. By comparison, Taiwanese TSMC, founded in 1987, took 30 years to catch up with the leaders. Now the company owns technologies for the production of microcircuits with standards from 90 to five nanometers.

Parameters in nanometers are a conditional technological indicator. The smaller its value, the more compact and efficient the chip and the more functions it can perform.

Domestic potential

Not all of the Soviet heritage in the field of microelectronics has been lost. In Russia , there is a production of microcircuits with design standards of 90 nanometers, there are developments for 65 nanometers. If we talk about consumer electronics, then this is the level of processors from 2005-2008. Such chips are not suitable for modern smartphones and personal computers, but they are quite enough for household appliances, cars, power plants, industrial equipment, as well as for solving most applied issues in the defense and space industries.

In 1992, on the basis of the Institute of Fine Mechanics and Computer Engineering, the Moscow Center for SPARC Technologies (MCST) was created. He is still working: he designs universal microprocessors used in Russian Elbrus computers, computer systems and operating systems. Another leader in Russian microelectronics, Baikal Electronics, develops Baikal processors and software for them.

Now, due to sanctions, both companies have problems with the supply of chips. The production of semiconductor wafers of the level of 90 and 65 nanometers was organized at the Mikron and Angstrem factories in Zelenograd , but wafers of 28 nanometers and higher were ordered in Taiwan from TSMC. The channel is now closed. In addition, there is a direct ban on the supply to Russia of equipment for creating microcircuits.

"Leading Russian enterprises have mastered and skillfully exploit foreign technological lines, producing high-quality products, including microprocessors," says Professor of the Department of Semiconductor Electronics and Semiconductor Physics, NUST MISiS , Doctor of Technical Sciences Petr Lagov. "The problem is that foreign companies do not sell their latest developments, what we put into operation, as a rule, is two or three generations behind the leading foreign models. And domestic equipment has not been produced at all for thirty years."

According to the scientist, for the revival of microelectronics in Russia, it is necessary to act in several directions at once. First of all, create your own means of production.

“Currently, huge prospects are opening up in the field of precision microelectronic engineering. It must be gradually restored, starting with relatively simple things and up to advanced lithographic complexes based on hard ultraviolet and, possibly, X-ray radiation, as well as ion doping equipment in a wide energy range,” — notes Petr Lagov.

Another direction is the organization of the production of high-quality semiconductor wafers for microcircuits. In Russia, silicon is already being made, however, so far in small quantities and only with a diameter of 200 millimeters. And for modern chips you need 300.

“The main task is in their precision machining: cutting, grinding and polishing,” continues the professor. “For plates up to 150 millimeters, there is previously purchased imported equipment, for those that are more than two hundred, no.”

Another problem is high-purity single-crystal silicon, a raw material for the production of wafers.

“We are good at growing silicon for solar energy. If we set specific tasks and allocate funding, we will get electronic,” says Arkady Naumov, head of the Astron Design Bureau, expert of the Commission for Scientific and Technical Development under the Russian government.

Two strategies: catch up or deepen

However, the executive director of the Association of Electronics Developers and Manufacturers (ARPE), Ivan Pokrovsky, believes that it is impossible to “replace imports” of silicon, like other elements of production, in the foreseeable future. This will take time and significant costs. Instead of the catch-up strategy that China has chosen, it suggests that Russian manufacturers look for their own niche.

“China has taken advantage of the trend of globalization and has become a “world factory.” Russia cannot go this way, and the conditions are different now,” explains Pokrovsky. one technological direction. And each requires investments from one to tens of billions of dollars a year. Such an amount of investment is needed to maintain technologies at the level of global corporations. External dependence will still remain. Therefore, it is more correct to strive not for self-sufficiency, but to increase sustainability in order to diversify risks, be able to manage them.

According to the expert, by creating its own chip factory, Russia will become even more technologically dependent on foreign suppliers of materials, equipment, spare parts, design tools and libraries of IP blocks.

“We need to cooperate with friendly countries, introduce standards that will ensure the compatibility of different solutions in equipment,” Pokrovsky argues. “It would be more correct now to support the Chinese SMIC project with all our might. semiconductor products.Even at the technological level that is now mastered in Russia, there are many promising areas.If we talk about Mikron, this is the production of microcontrollers - relatively simple logic circuits that do not require extreme topological standards.As large corporations transfer focus on more modern standards, there is a certain supply vacuum in ordinary technologies. Competition in these areas is falling, and they can become quite marginal".

Another option is to work with wide-gap semiconductors from the A3B5 group. Not silicon, but, for example, gallium arsenide. Such materials are needed for the production of power semiconductors, which are in great demand in connection with the development of electric transport, alternative energy, microwave electronics, optoelectronics, and 5G and 6G radio communications. Russia has historically strong developments here.

Development plan

The government is now discussing a plan to create its own production of radio electronics in the country. We are talking about the launch by the end of 2022 of the creation of microcircuits using a 90-nanometer process technology. American Intel produced processors of this level 19 years ago.

By 2024, they are going to complete the import substitution program in electronic engineering, and by 2030 form a "product portfolio of Russian technologies" and reach the level of 28 nanometers, mastered by world leaders ten years ago. At the same time, they plan to develop infrastructure, increase demand for domestic electronic products and raise personnel.

Despite the fact that four-nanometer processors are considered the most modern in the world today, and leading companies are preparing to move to the level of three and even two nanometers, the plan announced by the government seems to most experts to be "extremely ambitious." In their opinion, its implementation largely depends on the support of foreign partners, primarily China.

https://ria.ru/20220421/mikrochipy-1784536026.html