The company mainland China, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC), has taken two important steps to the manufacture of the chips themselves, for the mining cryptocurrencies.
This is an important initiative, taking into account the trade problems between China and the united States. The sanctions against the asian nation, prevent its companies with access to important agreements in the field of technology with other manufacturers around the world.
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Fundraising on the Stock exchange of Shanghai
The first step of SMIC, was the recent announcement about plans to get $ 2.8 billion. These funds are recaudarían, as they explained, by means of a public offer on the Stock exchange of Shanghai. The same would be dedicated to the manufacture of chips for mining.
In the past days, SMIC initiated the development of chips to 14 nanometers. But in this case were compounds Kirin 710A for Huawei.
Now, the company provided details about the characteristics of the devices miners manufactured. This is the mode Chip 14nm dedicated specifically to the mining virtual a digital currency that is not offered details.
In this sense, the mining of Bitcoin would be discarded. This as a result of the technical limitations of the company and taking into account the complexity of the work oriented to the more important of the cryptocurrencies.
To understand the level in regard to the manufacture of chips to 14 nanometers, it should be borne in mind that, for example, the 16nm correspond to the popular S9 (14TH/s). For their part, the chips to 7nm correspond to the series S17 pro (50TH/s). With this you can get an idea about the ability of these devices to miners projected.
SMIC has become one of the companies making chips more prized by Beijing. Source: Capital Watch.
Strategic alliance with mining company
The second step for SMIC to complement their work, it was the alliance with his countryman Canaan Creative. Both companies will work together for the development of the device mining described above and adapt it to the generation of cryptocurrencies.
Canaan Creative is a mining company great popularity in China and other countries. Established in 2013, is the manufacturer of the equipment ASIC Avalon Miner. Although it is far from compete with the giants that dominate the market such as Bitmain, their miners were well qualified until the recent announcement of multimillion-dollar losses at the beginning of 2020.
Some technical aspects
The manufacture of semiconductors, in the last two decades, has presented a tendency to monopoly. At the beginning of the century, when the chips 180nm were a cutting-edge technology, more than 30 companies were involved in its manufacture.
Currently, a handful of companies to develop the Chip 7nm, including Samsung, TSMC and Intel. The most recent abandonment of this exclusive oligopoly was Global Foundries, which was changed to another type of technology.
These same companies participated in the manufacture of chips 14nm, five years ago. This is a considerable period of time, technologically speaking. Based on this delay, it will begin SMIC. The chinese company belongs to a secondary group of manufacturers, which makes clear the reason why they did not decide on the mining of Bitcoin.
The problem of the trade war with the united States
SMIC, also form part of what is known as plan ‘Made in China 2025’. It is a project of Beijing, as pointed out by Geeksweb, which “requires that 70% of the domestic demand for semiconductors comes from local companies to 2025”.
But the sanctions of the united States become a great obstacle. The companies cutting-edge technology such as Samsung and others, may not have relationships with their peers in china. Taking into account that only 16% of the semiconductors used in China is produced within the country, the penalties are converted in a wall hard to overcome.
Some analysts believe that SMIC will take a decade to “close the gap” with important stakeholders.