China created the country's largest chip maker last week, taking a giant step forward towards Beijing's plan of becoming less reliant on foreign technology.
上周，中国境内最大的芯片制造商诞生了，这使得中国政府距离减少对国外科技依赖的目标又前进了一大步。
Under Beijing's direction, Tsinghua Unigroup, China's largest chip designer, acquired a majority stake in XMC, one of the China's leading chip maker and backed by the national semiconductor fund, the Wall Street Journal reported. A new holding company was created for XMC called Yangtze River Storage Technology, which has a registered capital of 18.9 billion yuan ($2.8 billion).
据华尔街日报报道，在政府的授意下，中国大陆最大的芯片设计商清华紫光集团完成了对行业领先的芯片制造商、由国家集成电路产业投资基金扶持的武汉新芯多数股权的收购，成立名为"武汉长江存储科技有限公司"的新控股公司，注册资金高达189亿人民币（28亿美元）。
Yangtze combines Tsinghua Unigroup's investment power and XMC's engineering team, said Roger Sheng, a Shanghai-based research director for semiconductors at Gartner IT , adding that the merger is the first case between two Chinese companies in the semiconductor industry.
武汉长江存储科技有限公司整合了清华紫光的投资能力和武汉新芯的技术团队。高德纳咨询（全球最具权威的IT研究与顾问咨询公司）上海公司总监Roger Sheng表示，两个中国本土企业合并在半导体制造业尚属首例。

China imports around $200 billion of chips a year, which is the biggest trade deficit in the global semiconductor market, according to state-run Xinhua news agency. The creation of Yangtze would indeed benefit the country in the long run, but it will first have a negative impact on the smaller domestic players, said Sheng.
根据新华社的报道，中国每年进口芯片的费用高达200亿美元，是全球半导体市场中最大的贸易逆差。Roger Sheng表示，从长远来看，武汉长江存储科技有限公司的成立有利于中国在该行业的发展，不过首当其冲受到影响的是中国国内规模较小的芯片制造商。
"Currently, I think other Chinese companies that want to invest in the memory business are most impacted because the new company will get the most resources and support from the Chinese government," he said. "The other companies or regional governments can't get as big an investment as Yangtze. Global chip makers are safe for at least a few years, with Yangtze needing at least two to three years to get commercialization capability, unless Tsinghua Unigroup can acquire companies with current mainstream 3D NAND (a next-generation flash memory chip) or DRAM (computer memory chips)."
Roger Sheng说道："我认为想要投资存储行业的国内企业受到的冲击应该最严重，因为武汉长江存储将会垄断大部分的资源，而且它还有政府的支持。其他制造商或是地方企业不可能获得像长江存储那么大的投资。全球性的芯片制造商暂时不会受到大的影响，因为武汉长江存储至少需要两到三年的时间培养商业化的能力，除非清华紫光可以并购拥有目前主流的3D NAND闪存技术和DRAM存储技术的企业。"
XMC, however, is developing today's leading-edge 3D NAND chips to be test-ready by the end of this year, said Hui He, a senior analyst for China's semiconductor market at IHS Technology.
不过，IHS公司半导体行业的资深分析师何慧却表示，目前武汉新芯已经在研制高水平3D NAND闪存芯片，即将在今年年末投入测试。
After the proven product ramp-up period, "all global memory vendors will be affected," said Gartner's Sheng. "Chinese companies could own the market with proven product manufacturing capabilities. It will definitely impact existing market players through cheaper and volume product supply."
Roger Sheng表示："在爬坡量产过后，全球的存储芯片供应商都会受到影响。届时，中国企业将拥有过硬的产品生产能力，有能力向市场提供更多，更便宜的产品。毫无疑问，目前半导体芯片市场的主要制造商一定会受到冲击。"