小小芯片引发中美角力

Seldom have such small chips carried such a heavy load. China’s fledgling semiconductor industry, after a messy birth, now finds itself in the crosshairs of conflicting political goals in Beijing and Washington.

小小芯片很少承载如此沉重的负荷。中国半导体行业在艰难起步后，如今发现自己成为了中美彼此冲突的政治目标的焦点。

Chips are a key plank of China’s industrial plans, attracting a massive $150bn government subsidy. This reflects national angst over reliance on overseas markets — it spends more on importing semiconductors than oil — and a fear, as one banker puts it, of being left in the dark “in case the US flips the switch”.

芯片是中国产业计划的关键支柱，受到1500亿美元的巨额政府补贴。这反映出国家对依赖海外市场的担忧——进口半导体的支出超过了石油进口的支出——也体现了另一层担忧，用一位银行家的话来说，“一旦美国关掉开关”，中国可能陷入黑暗之中。

Washington harbours its own fears: that these subsidies will distort the market, dent its own domestic industry, jeopardise the edge it has held in the technology and threaten security.

华盛顿也有自己的担忧：中国这些补贴将会扭曲市场，冲击美国国内产业，危及美国在相关科技领域的优势地位以及威胁国家安全。

“Chinese industrial policies in this sector, as they are unfolding in practice, pose real threats to semiconductor innovation and US national security,” wrote the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology in a letter to President Barack Obama earlier this month.

美国总统巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)的科学技术顾问委员会(Council of Advisors on Science and Technology)本月早些时候在写给总统的信中表示：“随着中国半导体产业政策逐渐落实，将对半导体创新和美国国家安全构成真实的威胁。”

China consumes more than $100bn worth of semiconductors, or roughly a third of total global shipments, but produces just 6 to 7 per cent by value, according to consultancy Bain & Co. Many of the imported chips go into PCs, smartphones and other gadgets that are then exported, but there is still a yawning gap between the semiconductors made by domestic chipmakers and the number consumed by a gadget-hungry Chinese public.

贝恩咨询公司(Bain & Co)的数据显示，中国每年消费的半导体价值超过1000亿美元，占到全球出货总量的近三分之一，但中国半导体产值仅占全球的6%-7%。许多进口芯片被装配于个人电脑、智能手机以及其他设备，随后出口至海外，但国内芯片商生产的半导体数量与中国公众消费的半导体数量之间仍存在巨大缺口。

Early efforts to narrow this gap failed: a scattergun approach resulted in a highly fragmented sub-scale industry. McKinsey, the consultancy, calculates Beijing had invested in 130 fabrication plants across more than 15 provinces at one point.

早先缩减这种缺口的努力失败了：“广泛撒网”方式导致了半导体行业碎片化，厂商缺乏规模。咨询公司麦肯锡(McKinsey)估算，中国曾经在同一时期在逾15个省份投资了130家半导体工厂。

But lessons have been learned, says Mark Li, semiconductor analyst at Bernstein, pointing to Hong Kong- and New York-listed SMIC. Initially, he says, it wanted to be as good as the top manufacturers and invested heavily in high-end equipment, racking up losses as a result.

但伯恩斯坦(Bernstein)的半导体行业分析师Mark Li表示，他们已经汲取了教训。他指的是在香港和纽约两地上市的中芯国际(SMIC)。他说，最初中芯国际希望和一流制造商做得一样好，大举投资购置高端设备，结果出现亏损。

“They adjusted their strategy to be a follower, and stay one to two steps behind Taiwan’s TSMC [the industry leader as a foundry making chips for others] and lowered investment a bit and reduced their R&D investment.”

“他们调整了战略，开始做一名跟随者，落后台湾的台积电(TSMC)一两步，稍微减少了投资并削减了研发支出。”台积电是晶圆代工行业的领军者。

SMIC, the fifth-biggest semiconductor foundry by revenues in 2015, according to Gartner, produces chip wafers mainly for communications and consumer devices. Roughly half its revenues come from overseas.

高德纳(Gartner)的数据显示，按收入计算，中芯国际在2015年是全球第五大半导体制造商，主要生产用于通讯设备和消费产品的晶圆。该公司约一半的收入来自海外。

This has served SMIC well. Its shares have generated a total return of 27 per cent in the past 12 months, massively outperforming the benchmark Hang Seng index. Of the 28 coverage analysts tracked by Bloomberg, not one recommends selling and 22 have a ‘buy’ rating.

这对中芯国际很有利。其股价在过去12个月里的累计涨幅高达27%，远胜于基准的恒生指数。在彭博(Bloomberg)追踪的28个研究该股票的分析师里，没有一人建议卖出，同时有22人给出了“买入”评级。

“Normally size gives you better margins, but SMIC defies this,” says Mr Li. “And that’s why it’s remarkable.” He estimates SMIC will lift revenues 30 per cent this year, compared with a 2 to 3 per cent rise predicted for UMC, Taiwan’s number two player.

Mark Li表示：“通常来说，规模会带来更高的利润率，但中芯国际不是这样。这是它引人注目的原因。”他估计中芯国际今年收入将会增长30%，而台湾排名第二的联华电子(UMC)预计只会增长2%-3%。

But at a national level, SMIC is just one of China’s champions. More ambitious is Tsinghua Unigroup, which in July merged its memory chip operations with government-run XMC.

但就全国来说，中芯国际只是中国的冠军企业之一。更具雄心的是紫光集团(Tsinghua Unigroup)，后者在去年7月将其存储芯片业务与政府运营的武汉新芯(XMC)合并。

Tsinghua has sought to plug another gap — a lack of leading-edge technology — by trying to buy overseas companies, including Micron of the US, for some $23bn. Yet it has been largely stymied by US regulators.

紫光寻求收购海外公司来弥补另一个差距——缺乏前沿技术——包括以大约230亿美元的价格收购美国的美光(Micron)，但该交易基本上已被美国监管机构阻挠。

Other attempts have met a similar fate. In February, Fairchild Semiconductor turned down a $2.6bn bid from Chinese state-backed enterprises over fears that the deal would be blocked by the US authorities.

中方其他收购努力遭受了类似的命运。在去年2月，飞兆半导体(Fairchild Semiconductor)拒绝了来自中国政府支持企业26亿美元的收购报价，原因是担心该交易被美国当局阻挠。

Failure to buy-in technology is one of the biggest stumbling blocks to Beijing’s efforts to become a global power in chips, say analysts. “Buying technology from the US will be more and more difficult,” says Mr Li of Bernstein, who alludes to a blocked attempted acquisition of Aixtron to show that even European deals fail. “But I think China will continue trying.”

分析师表示，无法收购技术是中国成为世界芯片大国的最大障碍之一。伯恩斯坦的Mark Li表示：“从美国购买技术将越来越困难。”他指出，收购德国爱思强(Aixtron)受阻表明，即便在欧洲交易也难以完成。“但我认为中国将会继续尝试收购。”

Roger Sheng, analyst at Gartner, says: “Without technology acquisition via [takeovers, joint ventures] or technology licensing, Chinese local companies still lack the capabilities to produce high performance processors and DRAM/flash [memory chips].”

高德纳分析师Roger Sheng表示：“如果没有(通过收购和合资)获得技术或者取得技术许可，中国本土公司仍会缺乏生产高性能处理器和动态随机存取存储器(DRAM)/闪存芯片的能力。”

Kevin Meehan, who heads Bain’s Asia technology practice, adds: “They can make progress in total production capacity. But they don’t have a clear path to obtain leading-edge process technology.”

贝恩亚洲技术业务主管凯文•米汗(Kevin Meehan)补充称：“他们可能在整体生产能力方面取得进步，但他们没有获得前沿加工技术的清晰途径。”

Nor is it just acquisitions at which the US is balking, as testified by this month’s report to President Barack Obama. In November, Penny Pritzker, US commerce secretary, attacked China’s $150bn plan, designed to ramp up Chinese-made integrated circuits at home to 70 per cent in 2025.

美国不仅仅在阻扰收购，本月美国官员对总统巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)所作的报告证实了这一点。去年11月，美国商务部部长佩妮•普里茨克(Penny Pritzker)抨击了中国拟投资1500亿美元、到2025年让集成电路自给率达到70%的计划。

Despite setting a bold goal, Beijing has been less clear on how it plans to get there or how the spending will be directed. But multinational chipmakers have spotted the momentum shift and have begun setting up manufacturing and partnerships in China.

尽管制定了大胆的目标，但北京方面没有明确说明打算如何实现目标或者如何支出这些资金。但跨国芯片制造商已经看到了形势变化，开始在中国设立制造工厂并展开合作。

The authors of the report to the US president, while noting that the $150bn spend is below the average $23bn spent annually on M&A by US semiconductor companies in the past five years, said acquisitions would help advance China’s aim. They identified two further strategies: “subsidies and zero-sum tactics”.

上述提交奥巴马的报告的作者们表示，收购将帮助推进中国的目标。尽管他们也指出，1500亿美元的支出低于美国半导体公司在过去5年年均230亿美元的并购支出。他们还注意到了两个更深层的战略：“补贴和零和战术”。

Three examples were listed of the latter, including “forcing or encouraging” domestic buyers to only purchase from local suppliers, “forcing” technology transfer in exchange for market access and intellectual property theft.

关于零和战术列举了三种情况，包括“迫使或鼓励”国内买家只向本土供应商采购、“强迫”以技术转让换取市场准入以及窃取知识产权。

Analysts add a further risk, one that has repercussions across the globe: pricing. As one analyst baldly puts it, “China is good at getting into businesses,” as it did with solar panels. “They are also good at shrinking profit pools” — alluding to the consequent oversupply and collapse of prices.

分析师还指出了另一个已在全球产生影响的风险：定价。正如一位分析师坦言的那样，“中国擅长打入商业”，他们在太阳能面板领域就是这样。“他们也擅长收缩利润池”，这里指的是因此导致的供应过剩和价格暴跌。

President-elect Donald Trump heightened concerns in December, when he raised the prospect of levying duties of up to 45 per cent on Chinese goods to level the playing field for US manufacturers.

美国当选总统唐纳德•特朗普(Donald Trump)在去年12月的言论加剧了人们的担忧，当时他提出了对中国商品征收最高45%进口关税的可能性，目的是为美国制造商营造公平竞争环境。

Such tariffs could hurt not just Chinese companies, but also the multinational players such as Qualcomm, Intel and Samsung that have set up shop in China, through joint ventures or partnerships.

此类关税伤害的可能不仅仅是中国公司，而且还有高通(Qualcomm)、英特尔(Intel)和三星(Samsung)等通过合资或合营方式在中国开展业务的跨国企业。

Some analysts point out that this co-operation, together with an ecosystem of suppliers on the ground, means China is closer to its goal of creating a globally competitive industry.

一些分析师指出，这种合作，加上实实在在的供应商生态系统，意味着中国距离打造具有全球竞争力的半导体行业的目标更进了一步。

“They’ve done it in PCs, in high-speed rail — but haven’t done that yet in semiconductors,” says Mr Meehan. “They are certainly closer than they were, but they are going to face obstacles.”

米汗表示：“他们已经在个人电脑和高铁领域实现了目标，但在半导体领域还没有实现目标。他们当然比过去更接近目标，但他们还会面临障碍。”