At the end of the year, looking back at the past 2024, the semiconductor industry has both growth and pain. Looking back at the status of the semiconductor industry in 2024, what are the long-term progress and what are the shortcomings? Looking forward to 2025, what opportunities will the semiconductor market have and how should it develop? To this end, Electronics Fans Network has planned the "2025 Semiconductor Industry Outlook" special topic and received the forward-looking views of dozens of domestic and foreign semiconductor innovation leaders. Among them, Electronics Fans specially interviewed Liu Yi, deputy general manager of new market development of Hongshi Intelligent. The following is his analysis and outlook on the semiconductor market in 2025.
Liu Yi, deputy general manager of new market development of Hongshi Intelligent
The silicon-based substrate solution has entered the next stage, and Hongshi Intelligent has steadily entered the track
Yancheng Hongshi Intelligent Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as: Hongshi Intelligent) was established in 2017 and focuses on the self-development of the core technology of the new generation of MicroLED micro-display optoelectronic chips. At present, Hongshi Intelligent has core technologies and patents such as 8-inch silicon-based metal bonding, quantum dot conversion, three-chip full-color, and microlenses, and has the ability to cover the entire industry chain from optical device design to module design and production. Hongshi Intelligent MicroLED micro-display chips have many advantages such as bright colors, high contrast, and low energy consumption. It has now achieved an annual production capacity of 1 million pieces and is one of the very few companies in the world with technical capabilities and mature mass production capabilities.
Liu Yi shared his observations on the MicroLED industry with Electronics Fans. As far as the MicroLED industry is concerned, silicon-based substrate epitaxial technology based on semiconductor process technology has gained more recognition. In 2024, the MicroLED preparation process will officially transition from the exploration period of sapphire substrates. As domestic brands increase their requirements for AR glasses display modules, MicroLED suppliers have begun to reserve mature MicroLED preparation solutions under silicon-based substrate solutions. Compared with the large amount of transformation costs consumed by the transformation of sapphire substrate to silicon substrate (such as equipment transfer, process re-research, personnel reorganization, etc.), Hongshi Intelligent has relied on its long-term sensor supplier status to quickly locate silicon-based substrate solutions since its establishment in 2017, and has successively invested in R&D personnel and R&D equipment to dig deep into the technology.
In the semiconductor industry, the mature technical accumulation of lithography equipment will become an important "stepping stone" to nourish the commercialization of MicroLED. Although in the MicroLED production process, core technologies such as epitaxial wafer growth and mass transfer are not exactly the same as traditional lithography technology, there is commonality in equipment functions, which is conducive to the rapid development of MicroLED technology research and development relying on the mature semiconductor IC industry.
"Last year, MicroLED manufacturers were still in the early stages of exploring this technology path. This year, it can be clearly seen that manufacturers have invested a lot of energy in deepening the silicon-based substrate solution, which also verifies that Hongshi Intelligent's initial judgment is correct." Liu Yi said.
AI+AR glasses are sweeping the market, and the operation of new production lines will increase shipment capabilities
The exploration of the application of large AI models in China has made significant progress in the domestic market. For example, starting from 2024, almost all mobile phone manufacturers and PC manufacturers are integrating the functions of AI big models into their own devices. This integration is not just an additional chat box, but a system-level call and feedback based on users' work, life and entertainment. At the new hardware level, the success of Meta Ray-Ban has also given Chinese companies greater confidence, so the end of the year has almost instantly ushered in the release of AI/AR glasses.
Faced with the market demand brought by AI big models, the full deployment of AI big models on the end means that the form of AI+AR glasses is about to sweep the Chinese wearable market and become the next consumer electronics explosion node. However, the end-side big model has great limitations on the experience enhancement of voice assistants, which will cause the human-computer interaction efficiency of wearable AI voice assistants to be far less useful than people imagine. Liu Yi pointed out that there are also two problems:
First, AI voice assistants or AI glasses are both early and immature products, and their interaction mode based on "voice" cannot bring a good user experience. At this time, it is necessary to load AR head-up display capabilities on the glasses. However, except for AR1, the current wearable device chips have not integrated and optimized the AR+AI capabilities at the soc level, which will become the shortcoming of AI glasses that cannot break through the low efficiency of human-computer interaction.
Second, for existing AI+AR glasses products, the integration and improvement of the two is not obvious. For example, the behavior of "ordering takeaway for me with AI" requires calling GPS, MCU and other capabilities, and optimizing and presenting computing power at the voice assistant and AR display levels in milliseconds, which is difficult for existing chips to do. This means that the use scenarios of spatial display, which are more inclined to deep AR+AI integration, are more challenging.
In 2025, AI+AR hardware terminal products will usher in exponential sales growth. Behind this, it relies on more mature and mass-produced optical display modules and more powerful application service ecosystems. Among them, Hongshi Intelligence focuses on the research and development and manufacturing of MicroLED micro-display chips for the optical display part of AR glasses. By the end of 2024, Hongshi Intelligence has reached strategic cooperation with many leading companies to jointly promote the development of new forms of AR glasses, and other XR-related customers have also completed sample delivery.
In terms of MicroLED technology and production capacity reserves, Hongshi Intelligent has invested more than 100 million yuan in the silicon-based substrate MicroLED chip technology. Among them, the most difficult technical problems such as epitaxial wafer growth, mass transfer, and monolithic color stacking are supported by independent patents. At the same time, the new production line located in Moganshan, Huzhou will be put into operation at the end of the year, and Hongshi Intelligent will have the ability to ship KK-level large quantities in 2025.
Outlook for 2025
Speaking of the outlook for 2025, Liu Yi said: In 2025, China's semiconductor industry will continue to move towards independent design and proprietary standards. This will be a relatively long process, but it is also the only way to build China out of the US semiconductor technology sanctions. In terms of new display chips such as MicroLED, although we have a difference between us and foreign countries, we are almost at the same starting line. Therefore, while maintaining the leading position of domestic technology, more practical and pragmatic exploration of application scenarios and monetization models is still a compulsory course for every AR glasses supply chain company in 2025.