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The Pentagon gets fully into the Rare Earth War with China. Has invested 400 million in the most promising US mine

July 11, 2025 by usatoday24

The US Department of Defense is about to establish itself as the largest shareholder of MP Materials. A few hours ago has announced who will buy shares of this mining company for A value of 400 million dollars. And, in addition, it will provide additional 150 million to help this company Extract and process rare earths which contains its Mountain Pass site, which is in California, although it resides very close to the border with the Nevada state. This mine is the only US site that contains some of the rare earths that are necessary to manufacture high -power industrial magnets, so it has become a very valuable strategic resource for the country led by Donald Trump. The US plan pursues Develop your own supply chain of rare earths with the purpose of eliminating any dependence on the global market of these chemical elements, which is controlled by China. The entry of the Department of Defense in the MP Materials shareholders reflects with absolute how important this mine for the US is from the point of view of national security. What is not yet clear is if it contains the rare earth range and in the right amount to meet the needs of US companies. In any case, with its investment the Pentagon intends to ensure the supply of rare earths to manufacture High power magnets for military applications For at least ten years. Why are rare earths so important to the US and its allies On April 4, just 24 hours after Donald Trump announced the taxes that he was going to apply to the importation of most products from abroad, The administration led by Xi Jinping responded. And he did it forcefully. In early December 2024 He chose to prohibit The export of some critical minerals to the US, among which were three essential metals for the chips industry: Gallium, Germanio and Antimony. Shortly after the Chinese government added two more critical metals to its list of export restrictions: the Scandio and the Disposio. These chemical elements are probably less known than metals prohibited by China previously, such as Gallium or Germanio, but are at least as important as the latter because They have a fundamental role In the industries of integrated circuits, telecommunications and the manufacture of storage devices. Chinese authorities are retaining in ports throughout the country not only rare earths, but also high -power magnets The ability to put pressure from China had not yet been extinguished. Just ten days later, on April 14, the Administration did not hesitate take another step forward With the purpose of putting in check, in addition to the industries that I just mentioned, those of electric cars, aeronautics and advanced armament. To achieve this, it effectively suspended, in addition to the export of the most valuable rare earths, that of high -power magnets that have a critical role in the industries that I have cited in this same paragraph. The Chinese authorities are retaining in the ports throughout the country not only the rare earths, but also the high -power magnets acquired by the electric cars manufacturers of the entire planet, the aerospace companies, the chip factories and Armament companies. Many of these organizations have high -power magnet reserves made with rare earths, but possibly only allow them to subsist a few months. Europe in particular is in an extremely delicate position. China’s export controls are directed mainly to the US, but the old continent It does not remain unscathed. At least for the moment. In fact, in Germany, which as we all know is the heart of the European car industry, There are already experts who assure that if China continues to retain rare earths and electric motors some essential parts of the electric cars production chain will stop in a few weeks. For the European car industry this blow would be very difficult to fit. European companies that are dedicated to the manufacture of semiconductors are also in a very compromised situation. According to Reuters Many European chip production lines They will stop very soon Due to the shortage of crucial supplies, which has led the European Chamber of Commerce to meet with officials of the Ministry of Commerce of China to ask them to allow rare earth supply to European companies that are dedicated to the production of integrated circuits. Image | The Pentagon More information | The Washington Post In Xataka | The US will not be able to contain the technological development of China. Experts from the chips industry forecast it

Intel and TSMC lead the revolution of photonic chips. His problem is that China has just done fully in this war

June 13, 2025 by usatoday24

Douglas Yu, a TSMC executive, The biggest chips manufacturer on the planetwith responsibility in the field of systems integration Explain clearly The disruptive capacity of integrated photonic circuits: “If we manage to implement a good system of integration of silicon’s photonics We will trigger a new paradigm. We will probably be placed at the beginning of a new era. “ The photonic silicon seeks to develop the technology of this chemical element to optimize the transformation of electrical signals into light pulses. The most obvious field of application of this innovation is the implementation of high performance links that, on paper, can be used both to solve communications between several chips and to optimize the transfer of information between several machines. Advanced packaging technologies with which the main semiconductor manufacturers work, such as TSMC, Intel or Samsung, can benefit a lot from a communication mechanism between very high performance chips. And the large data centers in which it is necessary to connect a large number of machines, too. However, there is a particular discipline to which it would be wonderful about the advantages proposed by the photonic silicon: the artificial intelligence (AI). China plans to use this technology in AI, 6G communications and quantum computers Intel and TSMC are some of the companies that have been working on the development of their technologies linked to the photonic silicon, and, as we can intuit, this innovation is no stranger to Chinese companies and research centers. In fact, in mid -May 2024 the Institute of Information Technology and Microsystems of Shanghai (China) in collaboration with the Lausanian Institute of Technology (Switzerland) reached a crucial milestone. Until that time one of the fundamental ingredients of the integrated photonic circuits was the lithium niobate. The lithium tantalate allows the manufacture of large -scale photonic chips and with much lower costs This synthetic salt intervenes in the manufacture of these integrated circuits because its physicochemical properties allow it to optimize the conversion of electricity into light, but it has a problem: the industrial exploitation of this technology is conditioned by The high cost that each wafer hasand also for the size of each of them. What these scientists have achieved is to replace the lithium niobate with other semiconductor material whose properties are even more attractive: the lithium tantalate (litao3). Ou Xin, one of the scientists who have led this project, assures That in addition to paying better than the lithium niobate, the lithium tantaloate allows the manufacture of large -scale photonic circuit and with much lower costs. This is because the manufacturing processes are similar to those currently used to produce conventional silicon semiconductors. This is the context in which, according to SCMPthe chips center for integrated photonics Xplore (Chipx) of the Jiao Tong University of Shanghai has announced that it has started the production of 6 -inch wafers for photonic chips. Interestingly, this production line Use Lithium Niobateso it still has a room to advance and take advantage of the properties of the lithium tantalate. Be as Professor Jin Xianmin, the director of CHIPX, says that the photonic integrated circuits have a huge potential not only in the training and inference of AI models, the classical supercomputing and Quantum computersbut also in the development of communications 6g. Image | TSMC More information | SCMP In Xataka | Today China and the US have parked their differences for a good reason: they will analyze together the risks of AI

Malaga gets fully into the chips industry. It is due to IMEC, the most important laboratory in Europe

June 11, 2025 by usatoday24

The Interuniversity Microelectronics Center or IMEC (Interuniversity Microelectronics Center) It is not a research center. It is the most experienced laboratory in the tuning of New integration technologies to manufacture integrated circuits and nanotechnology that we have in Europe. In fact, its engineers They work side by side with ASML techniciansTSMC, Intel or Samsung with the purpose of jointly developing new semiconductor packaging technologies or avant -garde photolithography techniques. This research center is housed in Leuven (Belgium), but in 2030 it will have a new laboratory that will be located in Malaga Techpark, an ambitious technological park installed in this Andalusian capital. José Luis Escrivá, the former Minister of Digital Transformation and Public Function, announced the arrival of Imec to Malaga In January 2024, but a year and a half later we have more important information. According to Malaga today The total cost of these facilities will amount to 615 million euros. The central government will contribute 500 million and the Junta de Andalucía the remaining 115. On the other hand, the Malaga Center of IMEC will have a total area of 51,300 square meters, and, more importantly, it will use 200 people of high qualification. After all, these researchers will participate in the search for alternatives to the silicon in integrated circuit production processes, as well as in the development of new photolithography technologies that will pursue make possible the manufacture of chips below 1 Nm. However, in addition to these direct jobs, this research center will attract Malaga to other important companies involved in the semiconductor industry. This is the most ambitious IMEC project: to manufacture 3 angstroms chips According to Imec In 2035 integrated circuit manufacturers will begin large -scale production of 3 angstroms chips (0.3 Nm). This milestone is very important because presumably these will be the first semiconductors made of the UVE Hyper-á lithography equipment in which ASML is already working. However, of course, these machines will not arrive that year; They will be ready much earlier. That will be the time when Chips manufacturers will start large -scale production, but possibly this machine will be prepared at the end of this decade. In 2039 chips manufacturers will go beyond the 2 angstroms Anyway, the interesting thing is that the opening of the optics of these avant -garde lithography equipment will be, again according to IMEC, of 0.75 in the face of the opening of 0.55 UVE UVE MACHINESor 0.33 in Conventional UVE teams. In any case, the itinerary of this laboratory anticipates that In 2037 the integrated circuits of 2 angstroms will arriveand in 2039 chips manufacturers will pass this barrier and go beyond the 2 angstroms. In the article we dedicate to Rayleight criteria We explain in a lot of detail what the ‘Na’ parameter consists (Numerical Aperture), But in this text it is enough to know that this variable identifies the opening value of the optics used by the lithographic equipment. In this context this parameter essentially reflects the same as the opening value when we talk about The optics of a photo cameraso it conditions the amount of light that the optical elements They are able to collect. As we can intuit, the more light gathens, the better. Image | Laura Ockel | Wikimedia More information | IMEC In Xataka | China needs to develop a new type of immune chips to US sanctions. And their scientists have just achieved it

Intel plans to get fully into the market in which South Korean SK Hynix has become rich: memories for AI

June 3, 2025 by usatoday24

The South Korean company SK Hynix leads the HBM memories market (High Bandwidth Memory) With a shocking authority. Your market share Broken 70%so that the remaining 30% are distributed by Samsung and the American memory manufacturer Micron Technology. These memoirs work side by side with the GPUs for artificial intelligence (AI). In fact, one of SK Hynix’s main clients, possibly the oldest, is Nvidia. According to the consultant Datam Intelligence The global market centers market for AI will grow annually 24.5%, so it will go from having a volume of 13,670 million dollars in 2024 to no less than 78,910 million in 2032. For designers and integrated circuit manufacturers compete in a market with this growth potential is crucial, hence several Chinese companies are planning to get into it. And for Intel represents a too juicy opportunity to let it escape. Intel and Softbank work together in a new type of memories for ia The manufacture of HBM memories is very complex. This is the reason why this market at the moment is distributed only to the three companies that I have mentioned in the first paragraph of this article. However, its great growth potential will surely cause other companies over the next few years. Intel is going to be one of them, although the interesting thing is that he will not compete alone or fight for the HBM chip market. Intel and Softbank have proposed to complete the development of a prototype and evaluate its viability from a technical point of view by 2027 This American company has founded a company specialized in the design and manufacture of memory chips from the Japanese investment group. His name Saimemory And he was born expressly to compete from you to you with SK Hynix, Samsung and Micron Technology. Your plan consists in developing a new type of High performance packed dram memory From some patents prepared by Intel and several Japanese research centers, among which is the University of Tokyo. Intel and Softbank have proposed to complete the development of a prototype and evaluate its viability from a technical point of view by 2027. In fact, they intend to manufacture on a large scale and market this dram memory stacked for ia before it ends this decade. The performance of HBM memories is very high, but, as I mentioned a few lines above, they are difficult to manufacture. In addition, they are expensive, they dissipate a lot of energy in the form of heat and consume a lot of electricity. Stacked dram memories, however, on paper will be easier to produce, more efficient, and also cheaper. If when they are really satisfied the expectations that have generated it is possible that They end up displacing HBM chips. In fact, Intel and Softbank are not at all the only companies that trust the potential of stacked dram memories; Samsung and Neo Semiconductor are also developing this type of chips, so before the Memoirs market expires this decade will be much more competitive than today. Image | Samsung More information | Nikkei Asia In Xataka | South Korea fears US reprisals. To avoid their old lithography equipment, they take dust on a warehouse

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