By Kate Yuan

(JW Insights) Aug 4 -- The National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) has planned to provide up to RMB46 million ($6.4 million) to finance dozens of projects focused on “chiplet” technology, which is seen as a short cut for the country to achieve semiconductor self-sufficiency amid US sanctions, reported South China Morning Post (SCMP) on August 3.

The NSFC, which is under the Ministry of Science and Technology, will fund as many as 30 research projects to be conducted over a period of three to four years, according to a notice published on its website on July 31. It said applications will be accepted from September 1 through 7.

It expects to fund research projects that include methods to dissect, combine and reuse chiplets, semiconductor design, three-dimensional chip processing techniques and the structure of high-performance ICs.

Established in 1986, the NSFC is responsible for directing, coordinating and making use of the national natural science fund to support basic research. The foundation increased its funding to RMB33 billion last year, up 6.8 per cent over 2021.

Chiplets, pre-developed silicon dies that can be packaged into a more complex processor, have gained much interest on the mainland because they reduce design costs and may even offer a solution to extending Moore’s Law, which refers to the doubling in the number of transistors on an integrated circuit (IC) every two years.

The goal of the NSFC’s latest programme is to “develop a research team with international influence to improve China’s indigenous innovation capabilities” in the field of semiconductors, according to the foundation’s notice.

The programme aims to find “a new technology path” for China in semiconductors through breakthroughs in the assembly and integration of chiplets, with an eye to raising the performance of these devices by “one or two levels”, the NSFC said.

The NSFC’s new initiative underscores Beijing’s resolve to push forward the country’s semiconductor self-sufficiency efforts amid US-led trade sanctions, which have derailed the mainland’s standing in global supply chains, according to the South China Morning Post report.