China is to put a third tranche of cash, worth $47.5 billion, into the Big Fund – the colloquial name for the China Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund.

The Big Fund was set up in 2014 with $19.2 billion. In 2019, a second tranche of cash worth $28.2 billion was put into the fund.

The disbursement of those funds led to corruption and incompetence charges. Lu Jun, CEO of  Sino IC Capital, which managed the fund was indicted on bribery charges last March, and many awards were made to companies with no experience in the semiconductor industry.

The original, 2014, remit of the fund was to bring the country’s semiconductor industry up to international standards by 2030 with investments in chip manufacturing, design, manufacturing equipment, and materials.

Recently it was thought that China had decided to concentrate on trailing edge chips and flood the market with them in an attempt to undermine the economics of the western chip companies.

However, this new tranche of cash may mean that it has reverted to its original aim of catching up with the West.