Yang Mong-song, co-CEO who recently submitted a resignation letter to SMIC, a Chinese foundry company. He worked at Samsung Electronics from 2011 to 2015 and served as Vice President of the Foundry Business Team. SMIC homepage capture
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China’s SMIC, the world’s fifth-largest foundry (semiconductor consignment production) company, has hired Chang Sang-i, who served as chief operating officer (COO) at TSMC, Taiwan as vice chairman. The recruitment of senior executives from TSMC, the world’s No. 1 foundry company, is positive news for SMIC. However, on the 16th, when the news was announced, SMIC’s stock price fell 4.94% in the Hong Kong stock market and 5.53% in the Shanghai stock market. In the semiconductor industry, analysts say that this is because investors were discouraged by the news of the sudden’resignation’ of SMIC co-CEO Yang Mong-song, which flowed out of the day rather than recruiting the vice chairman. What kind of person is Yang Mong-song who shook the stock price of China’s No. 1 foundry company?
Fungwoon-ah in the semiconductor industry with 450 patents from TSMC
Representative Mong-Song Yang is called the’Fung Woon-ah’ of the East Asian semiconductor industry. Just by looking at the history, you can see that it is’not ordinary’. He is Taiwanese. Born in 1952, he completed his undergraduate and master’s degree in electrical engineering in Taiwan. Later, he received Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering and computer engineering from UC Berkeley. SMIC introduces it like this.
Dr. Yang has over 34 years of experience in the semiconductor industry and has been engaged in the development of memory and advanced logic process technologies. It holds more than 450 semiconductor patents and has published more than 350 technical papers.
After working at AMD in the US, he worked as an engineer at TSMC, a foundry company in his home country, since 1992, and was selected as the’best expert’ in the field of’FinFET’ process technology. Finpet is a structure in which the area where the gate and the channel meet by raising the semiconductor channel as if building a building. It is named because the channel shape resembles a fin. In view of the fact that the wider the surface between the gate and the channel, the higher the efficiency, and the structure was changed to a structure that touches on three planes rather than a plane.
Yang suddenly resigned from TSMC in 2009 and taught Samsung Electronics’ semiconductor manpower by working as a visiting professor at Sungkyunkwan University in South Korea with an enemy at Tsinghua University in Taiwan.
Contributing to Samsung’s development of the world’s first 14nm process
In 2011, when the ban on turnover was lifted, Professor Yang will be an executive research fellow in the foundry business team of Samsung Electronics’ System LSI Division. The foundry business team is the predecessor of the foundry business unit, which was split into an independent business unit in 2017.
Since joining both members in 2011, Samsung Electronics’ foundry technology has shown a leap forward. Samsung Electronics, whose circuit line width (gate width through which current flows) was 28nm (nanometer, 1 billionth of a meter) was the latest, surprising the semiconductor industry by developing the world’s first ’14nm’ Finpet process in 2014. It developed the latest technology ahead of the world’s No. 1 TSMC. The latest 14nm process played a big role in Samsung Electronics surpassing TSMC in winning a contract for Apple’s iPhone AP (application processor) contract production. Both members are promoted to the’Vice President’ level.
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The lobby of the TSMC headquarters in Taiwan. Photo = EPA
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Yang’s mother TSMC did not stand still. In 2014, TSMC sued Vice President Yang. Vice President Yang from TSMC went to Samsung Electronics and insisted that TSMC’s core patent was handed over to Samsung Electronics. Taiwan’s Supreme Court ruled that “Vice President Yang Mong-song cannot work for Samsung Electronics until the end of 2015.” Vice President Yang Mong-song left the company after reinstating Samsung Electronics in early 2016.
Moved from Samsung Electronics to SMIC in China
About a year later, in September 2017, the place where Yang’s former vice president of Samsung Electronics became’COO (Chief Operating Officer)’ is SMIC, a leading foundry company in China. Former Vice President Yang will take the lead in enhancing SMIC’s foundry technology as co-CEO and Chief Technology Officer.
Representative Yang played a major role in mass-producing products in recent SMIC’s 14nm finpet process by showing his main specialty. In the first half of this year, SMIC succeeded in mass production by receiving orders for Huawei’s 14nm application processor (AP)’Kirin 710A’. SMIC’s technology, which was evaluated as a third-class in the global market, has been raised to the second-class level.
Recently, SMIC, like TSMC and Samsung Electronics, is working hard to introduce ultra-fine processes under 7nm. The Chinese government is also fully supporting SMIC. SMIC raised about 9 trillion won through the second listing of the Science Innovation Edition on the Shanghai Stock Exchange in July. All of this money is expected to be used to enter the ultrafine process. Last year, while promoting the introduction of EUV (extreme ultraviolet) exposure equipment from ASML in the Netherlands, which is essential from the 5nm process, the US government failed to check it.
When SMIC emerged with Huawei as a symbol of the success of Chinese semiconductors, the US government drew a sword. The U.S. Department of Commerce and Department of Defense recently put SMIC on a’blacklist’ like Huawei to prevent leakage of U.S.-made equipment and technology.
Submitted’resignation letter’ after being pushed out of the power game surrounding personnel
In this situation, news was delivered that Yang has left SMIC. Stock market investors responded more sensitively to Mongsong Yang’s retirement from SMIC than that of SMIC’s recruiting of the former vice chairman of TSMC COO.
As the cause of Yang’s turnover,’discord over greetings’ is mentioned. According to foreign media, in a letter to SMIC’s board of directors, Yang said, “We made desperate efforts to complete a total of 5 processes from 28nm to 7nm in 3 years,” and claimed that “a typical foundry company would take more than 10 years.” In this situation, the president of TSMC, who is his family, resigned when the former COO was recruited as a higher vice chairman. It is said that Yang was opposed to the recruitment of the general manager. Some people have a discord with Zhao Haijun, who served as co-president.
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If SMIC’s foundry business is hit by the departure of President Yang, Korean foundry companies are expected to benefit. This is because SMIC was a’potential competitor’ aiming to enter the 7nm process, which only Samsung Electronics and TSMC could do.
SMIC weakening is positive for mid-sized Korean foundry companies
At the same time, there are also observations that it will be easier to secure customers for small and medium-sized domestic foundry companies actively targeting the Chinese market. Looking at SMIC’s 2Q sales composition, by region, China (including Hong Kong) accounted for 66.1% ($620.32 million), and by process, the proportion of lines over 90nm reached 42.7%. This substantially overlaps with the market that small and medium-sized foundry companies such as DB HiTek and SK Hynix System IC are actively targeting. SK Hynix System IC, a subsidiary of SK Hynix foundry, recently held a ceremony to commemorate mass production of a foundry plant in Wuxi, China, and started production of products in earnest.
Reporter Hwang Jeong-soo [email protected]
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