CHIPS Act rivalry between Intel and TSMC prompts White House ‘slap

Intel isn’t mentioned anywhere, it also somehow misses that Texas Instruments and Global Foundries each applied for $5B for new plants along with a slew of others.

The article is reaching for clickbait conclusions.
 
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Lakados said:
Intel isn’t mentioned anywhere, it also somehow misses that Texas Instruments and Global Foundries each applied for $5B for new plants along with a slew of others.

The article is reaching for clickbait conclusions.
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We learned yesterday that Intel has been arguing that US companies should get priority, while TSMC retorted that this would not be an effective basis for investment decisions.

White House clarifies its goals​

Bloomberg reports that the White House has responded by clarifying the objectives of the CHIPS Act funding.

As President Joe Biden’s administration prepares to accept requests for $39 billion in funding to jumpstart US production of microchips, his commerce chief emphasized the program’s focus is strengthening national security rather than boosting struggling chipmakers […]
 
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Mega6 said:
We learned yesterday that Intel has been arguing that US companies should get priority, while TSMC retorted that this would not be an effective basis for investment decisions.

White House clarifies its goals​

Bloomberg reports that the White House has responded by clarifying the objectives of the CHIPS Act funding.
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I see that they have been saying that, but Intel is by no means a "struggling company", Texas Instruments on the other hand, put in a $5 billion request so they can build a "new" 300mm wafer fab and increase their 45nm manufacturing capacity, Global Foundries, who made a similar funding request backed by GM and Ford and their lobbyist army. Then you have all the other small US ones like SkyWater Semiconductor, Micron, Analog Devices, Microchip Technology foundry services, Maxim integrated, there is a pretty big list of foundry operators crawling out of the woodwork trying to get in on the money, many asking for more in funding than they make in several years.
Intel is certainly fighting for a bigger slice of the pie, but I doubt the Whitehouse remarks were directed at them. But they do have to give priority to military parts obviously so TSMC wins there because it makes the Altera and Xilinx FPGAs used in their current fighter jet fleets as well as the control systems they all talk too.
 
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The auto makers reaally need to be supported here as we all saw what happened to production and new/used car prices when they had no control units to run vehicle systems.
 
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Lakados said:
I see that they have been saying that, but Intel is by no means a "struggling company", Texas Instruments on the other hand, put in a $5 billion request so they can build a "new" 300mm wafer fab and increase their 45nm manufacturing capacity, Global Foundries, who made a similar funding request backed by GM and Ford and their lobbyist army. Then you have all the other small US ones like SkyWater Semiconductor, Micron, Analog Devices, Microchip Technology foundry services, Maxim integrated, there is a pretty big list of foundry operators crawling out of the woodwork trying to get in on the money, many asking for more in funding than they make in several years.
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"struggling company" sort of does fit the current Intel situation btw - have you actually looked at Intel's debt, radically cutting its dividend? It's free money so of course everyone wants a piece. As stated, not every will get a piece. Believe it or not all of the chips in the f35 and the like are not cutting edge 3nm. However there is a ton of "mid level" chips in use there.
 
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Mega6 said:
"struggling company" sort of does fit the current Intel situation btw - have you actually looked at Intel's debt? It's free money so of course everyone wants a piece. As stated, not every will get a piece. Believe it or not all of the chips in the f35 and the like are not cutting edge 3nm. However there is a ton of "mid level" chips in use there.
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I don't know if struggling is the right word, but I suppose Biden may see it that way, but I still think it was more directed at the senators and lobbyists clamoring for his attention on why the small semiconductor fabs in their states should get funding so they can modernize and upgrade.
Intel's debt isn't that bad, $38B with $28B and change cash in hand, considering they are in the process of building 4 new fabs right now, and announced plans for 4 more this is pretty good.

The DoD has been putting up a lot of angry stuff lately, Skywater makes most of their stuff and is still on 90nm and 130nm, they have been angry that the PRC has been able to keep a constant supply of modern ASICs throughout the whole chip shortage, while they struggle to source FPGAs they have to program in-house because there are no current "trusted" sources for them to source any modern ASICs themselves.

They are also pissed at TSMC though for their stance on the new Arizona fab and as such the Military can't use it either:
While Apple and AMD aim to buy chips from TSMC’s Arizona site, the fab isn’t likely to be a DoD supplier, Burns said.
“I don’t think TSMC would do that,” he said. “If you’ve seen their stance on American engineers, they don’t seem very pleased with them.”
TSMC founder Morris Chang has said in a number of Taiwanese publications that the plant in Arizona is doomed to fail and they are prepared for that because, insert standard stuff here about how Americans are lazy, and they don't want to work, and they ask too many questions, blah blah blah.
A number of Taiwanese Engineers have also made comments about how they constantly have to pick up the slack for the American workers because they won't work, but their culture sees 12h days 6 days a week while being on call 24/7 as a perfectly normal thing, needless to say, the American workers disagree.
They also weren't happy that Intel was "poaching" their better candidates with their new plant opening up nearby

But that is why the DoD has been working with Intel and their announced Intel Foundry Services to get them access to onshore leading-edge foundry technology and is in the process of cutting them a cheque under the Rapid Assured Microelectronics Prototypes-Commercial program (Jesus that is awkward) and Intel will be working with a number of the existing members of the US Military Aerospace and Government Alliance to get them design tools and training to design parts for the new modern nodes that Intel will be opening up for them.

Additionally, it should be noted that TSMC is blaming Intel for the high costs of the project because they are having to fight them for building materials and construction crews, and they have hinted that the only reason they are building the plant is because of mounting political pressure. So while US news sources like to say "OH! TSMC has decided to spend 4x more on the project YAY!", over there they are saying "They are making us spend 4x more because their supply chain and red tape is ridiculous" so in Taiwan they are getting blasted for bowing to the Americans and that the Phoenix project will yield no benefit for TSMC or Taiwan.
 
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learners permit said:
Are they also expecting to require jumper nets for suicidal employees like they do in Taiwan?
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You assume they can find people to take the jobs. Finding 4,500 skilled engineers in the current economy is going to be a tricky feat.
Between TSMC, Intel, Global Foundries, and Texas Instruments and their new fabs they are all building they need something like 20,000 skilled engineers and technicians. I have no clue where they think they are going to find them all because I doubt they currently exist and are looking for jobs stateside right now..
 
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The DOD is going to fund TSMC so they’re not stuck in Intel 7+++++++ for the next decade.
 
Mega6 said:
"struggling company" sort of does fit the current Intel situation btw - have you actually looked at Intel's debt, radically cutting its dividend? It's free money so of course everyone wants a piece. As stated, not every will get a piece. Believe it or not all of the chips in the f35 and the like are not cutting edge 3nm. However there is a ton of "mid level" chips in use there.
Click to expand...

Intel’s “struggling” because of years of bad management and stagnation. That shouldn’t entitle them to a government grant when there are companies out there that are demonstrating they can actually execute for the DOD.
 
Lakados said:
You assume they can find people to take the jobs. Finding 4,500 skilled engineers in the current economy is going to be a tricky feat.
Between TSMC, Intel, Global Foundries, and Texas Instruments and their new fabs they are all building they need something like 20,000 skilled engineers and technicians. I have no clue where they think they are going to find them all because I doubt they currently exist and are looking for jobs stateside right now..
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Where they always get the skilled workers on the cheap - H1B
 
Mega6 said:
Where they always get the skilled workers on the cheap - H1B
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They could be it would be like a solid 1/3’rd of all the Visa’s they permit in a year and the existing employers already fight over the supply of them because the 65,000 a year isn’t nearly enough.
 
Lakados said:
They could be it would be like a solid 1/3’rd of all the Visa’s they permit in a year and the existing employers already fight over the supply of them because the 65,000 a year isn’t nearly enough.
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There are a lot of h1bs out of work due to tech layoffs.. so it's all about timing for them. There are more displaced engineers (Americans with Engineering degrees working outside their field) here than most anywhere in the world. The workers will be there. In my younger days,I'd pick my stuff up and be there in a heartbeat - and that's exactly what I did for my first job as a y2k programmer/consultant. COBOL. yuk
 
serpretetsky said:
Are you referring to China (Foxconn in particular?). I cant find any large suicide stories about Taiwan.
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People offing themselves there nah, dying from various forms of heart failure from a combination of poor diet, lack of sleep, and exhaustion though… working yourself to death is not terribly uncommon that side.
 
Lakados said:
People offing themselves there nah, dying from various forms of heart failure from a combination of poor diet, lack of sleep, and exhaustion though… working yourself to death is not terribly uncommon that side.
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Yeah, it's an Asian thing - for the good of the "whole society". Ingrained into their culture. Some American WFH jobs are like that too. Because you WFH - you are on call 24/7/365 and end up working +80 hrs a week. I walked away from that. Paid well, no commute was great but - not very challenging.
 
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Mega6 said:
There are a lot of h1bs out of work due to tech layoffs.. so it's all about timing for them. There are more displaced engineers (Americans with Engineering degrees working outside their field) here than most anywhere in the world. The workers will be there. In my younger days,I'd pick my stuff up and be there in a heartbeat - and that's exactly what I did for my first job as a y2k programmer/consultant. COBOL. yuk
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Yeah but they have 6 months to land a job, these plants don’t open till 2024 on the early side, way more than 6 months out so they would need to go through the re application process assuming they don’t find other employers between now and then.
 
Lakados said:
Yeah but they have 6 months to land a job, these plants don’t open till 2024 on the early side, way more than 6 months out so they would need to go through the re application process assuming they don’t find other employers between now and then.
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Everyone overstays their visas here all the time. It's not a priority to catch and deport h1bs. Coming from the 3rd world country per se in a lot of cases - they are not immune to working lower level jobs to get by for a while either. Trust me - they rarely go back while of working age. Employers are very helpful with paperwork in this regard - to put it politely. To put it another way - yeah they will falsify forms to get cheap high skilled workers. You dont really see it in the papers but it happens more than you think. Oh - and a lot get married to a US citizen too.

Seems the backlash against h1b has subsided, jobs are more plentiful and are paying better now.
 
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If the legislation was designed to help American companies, they wouldn't have removed that language from the bill in the first place.

It would be in Taiwan's best interest to NOT allow TMSC to manufacture in the US. TMSC is a huge part of the reason why the US would defend Taiwan from China.

...and why is it "Apple" chipmaker TMSC? TMSC manufactures chips for alot of companies. Apple doesn't own TMSC.
 
sleepeeg3 said:
If the legislation was designed to help American companies, they wouldn't have removed that language from the bill in the first place.

It would be in Taiwan's best interest to NOT manufacture in the US. TMSC is a huge part of the reason why the US would defend Taiwan from China in the first place.

...and why is it "Apple" chipmaker TMSC? TMSC manufactures chips for alot of companies. Apple doesn't own TMSC.
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It's more than just TSMC for the reason we help Taiwan, it has been historical since its inception. Commie vs Democracy go a long way as far as foreign and domestic policy nowadays as it did in the 50/60s. Globalization is over. It's China/Russia/Iran/NK vs the West, SK, Taiwan. Much more at stake now. Taiwan is an integral engine for Western powers, just like South Korea and Japan is. Not just for their products - but for their style of government as well.
 
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learners permit said:
The auto makers reaally need to be supported here as we all saw what happened to production and new/used car prices when they had no control units to run vehicle systems.
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Auto makers need to be bitchslapped for cancelling their chip orders then pitching a fit when then capacity was sold to other customers.
 
learners permit said:
The auto makers reaally need to be supported here as we all saw what happened to production and new/used car prices when they had no control units to run vehicle systems.
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no they don't, all you have to do is look at what happened when the government bailed them out last time.
jfreund said:
Auto makers need to be bitchslapped for cancelling their chip orders then pitching a fit when then capacity was sold to other customers.
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100%, the japanese and korean manufactures were way ahead of the game as well stockpiling as much as they could when they saw US companies cancelling orders in late 2019/early 2020.
 
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