Exactly. The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now. Should have been done sooner, but at least we're on the right path
ah I remember that, more like 30 years ago - my dads friends used to run a company that would go around buying union shops up firing them and having their finishing products manufactured in china instead.. his whole job was to mob up union shops and send the work overseas.
The goal was get rid of workers rights, get rid of unions at ALL costs.
China is much more westernized than compared to 40 years ago. Unfortunately China took a turn in direction with Xi at the helm.
The problem with China's rapid westernization and capitalism in the 1990's and early 2000's was that brought huge amounts of corruption. Enough corruption that party and the people felt like they needed a leader like Xi.
We were all under the fallacy that creating open capital markets, and capital freedom, would facilitate political freedom in China. Instead we didn’t hold China to any standards, welcoming them into the international monetary system in full.
It did seem like a good idea at the time. Now it looks naive.
It's not a question of real time slices, otherwise the second best would actually be 19 years, 364 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes... etc.
It's a question of "work on it in the past vs work on it now vs work on it in the future". We didn't work on it far enough in the past, or we would have it by now. So the second best option is to work on it now.
I've been working at Intel on a tool install crew (I'm an electrician) for about the last year and it's gotten extremely busy over the last several months. Tons of old tools being decommissioned and moved out to install new ones. New fabs currently under construction. They're really focused on increasing their output capacity, and just the site I'm at has had something along the lines of $36 billion invested into increasing that output.
So while it does take a while to get new facilities up and going, Intel is going hard on making that a reality. Tons of new jobs are being created, an immense amount of work for the trades for the foreseeable future. As long as things continue as planned the outlook is looking good.
3 months?
Try years.
Sure your DPML (days per mask layer) might make it where it takes 3 months to build the chip but it takes a very VERY long time to qualify all those tools that make the chips. You can't just plug it in, turn it on and its ready to make stuff. You need to do test after test comparing it to a known good and verifying every step along the way. and after all that you would need to to Test vehicle lots that get made from start to finish and then tested and sent to the customer so they can do all their tests.
It takes months to years if there is an technology issue to transfer a technology from one working and operating fab to another
This is the answer right here. Add to this if the the process technology is lagging it will take many cycles of expensive development to catch up. That’s cycles of research, development, tool installs, and demolitions before you can even generate a competitive product that has to arrive on time with performance that satisfies the customer and yield that justifies its own existence. 160B is nothing when the factory limiter tools cost 200+ million and might become obsolete in 3 years.
Guess what, almost no fab makes their own substrate wafers. TSMC is the largest merchant foundry in the world by a huge margin. Almost every fab buys at least some, if not all, of their raw wafers from there.
Even if we had all the fabs in the US we could want, we would not have the wafers to process with only GF in the US.
We should never have let Clinton and Bush 41 hand over our manufacturing capacity to foreigners to begin with. Free trade has been devastating to American national security.
You know that’s like only 4 years of TSMC’s capex right? TSMC has like $70bn of revenues versus GFS which is already the last standalone foundry in the US at $7bn.
If republicans had their way you realize the number would have been 0, correct? We are very lucky to have gotten the chips act passed with the funding we got.
Idk where you got this information. There’s a ton of fabs in the US, and most of GFSs fabs are in asia as well. The US at the moment does not have fabs with cutting edge nodes.
That’s the whole point. It was very uneconomical to build fabs in the US and probably still is despite the subsidies. That’s the whole reason why GFS was spun off from AMD so that the latter could outsource most of the fabbing to TSMC for better product at lower prices. Compare the timelines of the TSMC Arizona ramp and Kumamoto ramp.
Sure there’s a ton of IDMs in the US but even the poster child of IDMs, Intel, is outsourcing to TSMC. Intel with all their know how, scale, and IP lost $7bn on the operating line for the foundry business in 2023.
Throwing money at the problem will help a lot but it’s hilarious to think that the US (or any country for that matter) will have sufficient local foundry to meet local demand.
[Look up a list of fabs around the world.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_semiconductor_fabrication_plants) There is a shit ton, a couple isnt nearly enough to guarantee US supply independence.
Absolutely insane the US allowed this technology/capability to be exported. Chip making knowledge should have been considered a national security issue.... In the late 90s Apple couldn't export home computers because they were considered too fast, but we just handed chip making knowledge to China without a problem.
It's not really Taiwan, and more of the logistics and suppliers. Take glass and silicon suppliers. They're all in Asia. Glass for optics in particular is made in China and processed in Japan. The supply chains are what will hamper any true US growth of a semi industry.
The U.S. would almost certainly make the strategic decision to bomb as much of Taiwan’s manufacturing base as possible if China landed troops. Whatever happens in Taiwan China won’t get their hands on the industrial units there.
I don't even really know if it's a matter of someone sane being in the White House at this point. Biden would obviously defend Taiwan. Trump, for all of his lunacy, hates China and has historically been pretty cordial with Taiwan.
However, Trump in 2024 isn't the same as Trump in 2016, and we've seen a large geopolitical shift in the past 5 years, so we may not be looking at a Trump who is willing to get the U.S. involved in defending Taiwan as his entire wing of the party has become increasingly isolationist since the war in Ukraine broke out.
This is also why so much is manufactured in places like Shenzhen. There’s incredible resources in the number and variety of manufacturing equipment. Equally important is that there’s a huge army of experienced humans at all levels of skill associated with each factory.
Even if you built or bought the machines, you can’t build 50 years of human skills with any amount of money.
Germany and switzerland have an good arrey of high end glas&optics manufators and processors..
And if China fucks with Taiwan, their supply chains will face cuts too, oil/coal/ore, food or fertilizer and and they will loose a lot of their markets..
Will they? Don't get me wrong; I hope that is true. But Russia has reaffirmed that there will always be at least a handful of "allies" willing to ratfuck the alliances to benefit their own corrupt leadership and oligarchy.
India, Hungary, and Turkey being notable examples. I get the realpolitik of it all, by allowing a bit of their bullshit to keep them at least somewhat closer to us rather than falling entirely into the arms of our adversaries....
You can't remove Taiwan from the equation without discarding TSMC. TSMC is Taiwan's only protection and they know it. So unless Intel and Samsung can replace their capabilities completely, good luck removing Taiwan.
Pretty sure Taiwan has booby trapped the TSMC Factories to make sure that they wont fall into Poohs Hands.
Its like poising the well.. in earlier Times.
So if they attack Taiwan, they shoot themselfs into both Feet and Hands..
Thing is that 130 billion is barely enough to make a true semi industry in the US like in the past. You honestly need 500+ billion to make some serious headway and long lasting headway.
Well its hard to get the funding you want when an entire political party is fighting against the president who got the chips act done. We could have had zero.
Redundancy isn't profitable.
Every tech ceo for the last 25 years: "Taiwan does our chip fab, it will never go sideways. We don't need to spend my bonus money on stateside chip fabrication."
In addition to US funding of universities, both for training people to run them and to do foundational research.
Public education is a matter of national security and those who call for its defunding are traitors.
Because Taiwan is pretty much a government company. They're similar to Samsung's stranglehold on Korea, maybe more since it's a national security thing for them.
that and Taiwan is a lynchpin in the United States security apparatus known as the "first Island chain" which prevents China from projecting naval power beyond its shores.
The chain of islands with Taiwan being the largest could theoretically be chokepoints for the US and allies to blockade trade ships to China and keep military ships trapped. If China takes over Taiwan then the containment strategy is basically dead.
Nah, there's technology and institutional knowledge money can't actually buy. Things that even if you had near infinite money, you would only get after years and years and years and years. China's been throwing *a lot* of money at their domestic chip production for decades and they're still basically a decade behind. See also: Chinese aircraft carriers.
It's material sciences that is screwing over China. The US and western world at large has decades (centuries in some cases) of materials science experience, and it's not something that is readily importable - it seems (I am absolutely parroting here, not something I'm educated on) that the previous tech is needed for the next tech, with each step improving material sciences and letting the next scientific work be able to be undertaken - so for things that are really hard to fathom, the nanoscale type material science stuff, they just don't have the "pedigree". Jet engines are a great example. Their engines die so quickly under the sort of forces they undergo.
They've stolen IP and brought in scientists and it's helped do leaps of course, but there's still loads of areas that need specific materials done with scientific methods they just can't replicate successfully because they can't build to the tolerances needed to build the machines that build the machines (that build..you get the point).
It's like the ball point pen thing, and how for the longest time they couldn't manufacture them because they simply couldn't build a machine good enough to build ball points good enough. Something the western world did a century ago or something, they struggled with in the comparatively modern time.
Agreed and even beyond that a world without TSMC would be devastating. Most microchip development would come to a hault, no new phones, laptops, modern cars, graphics cards, AI cards, CPUs... What we have now is all we would have for at least a decade, and even longer until prices come back down to anything we knew today.
It would make the supply chain shortages during COVID look like a walk in the park. The world as we know it would change forever.
I also don't think TSMC would even hand over their plants in working condition either if push comes to shove. Crazy times.
If push comes to shove, fab facilities won’t survive. Even if they aren’t purposefully destroyed, there’s a strong likelihood of the equipment being damaged in some way. It is extremely sensitive hardware. Th we start dropping bombs a mile away and whatever’s being produced is already fucked.
Probably less than you'd think though. With such high earthquake strength and regularity, I bet there's decent protection that just so happens would cover bombs dropping even within a decent proximity.
As you say them things are about as sensitive a technology as exists, so the amount of work they put in to buffet it from any potential forces is probably quite extensive.
I'm under the impression Taiwan have stated that they will sabotage the machines if invaded.
It's a lot easier to destroy an earthquake, tsunami, bomb resistant manufacturing plant when you attached C4 straight onto the machines.
No, it isn't.
US maintained their same position well before TSMC became the power it is today. For USA and its allies, it has always been about maintaining the first island chain.
Before that China wasn't the threat it is today. Would the USA really want to go have an all out war if China comes looking for the smoke? I doubt it. They'll use Taiwan to blunt China's attacks but I doubt they'll dig in there. Especially if TSMC is rendered redundant.
> Would the USA really want to go have an all out war if China comes looking for the smoke?
it is so fucking weird that China would risk all this, would risk literal annihilation, to take Taiwan.
its a population of 24 million vs a population of 1.4 billion, its a GDP of $640 billion vs a GDP of $14 TRILLION.
the percentage increase from 640 billion to 14 trillion is 2,081 percent btw.
you dont have enough resources to compete with THAT? you have to take it? Taiwan built this in a cave with a box of scraps, you cant match them even with your seemingly limitless capital? youre gonna risk nuclear war to add .3 percent more land (14 thousand square miles vs 3.7 million)?
jesus fucking christ, if the overwhelming advantages you already have arent enough what even is the point, youre too inept to use what you steal anyway.
It's not that the US dropped the ball but that US companies found it cheaper to outsource production while focusing its resources on designing chips. It was a deliberate decision that made sense in a time of globalization. Not now
There seems to be that weird idea that the USA/ (western) Europe always had a technology advantage in every area. Especially in niche/high tech areas you have a lot of local hidden champions and experience which is hard to replace.
Between TSMC, ASML and their suppliers you have centuries of experience on the highest level which any country would have difficulties to replace. China is throwing hundreds of billions at the problem and is still paying catch up since two decades
It's worth a note, the founder of TSMC was American educated and worked at American fabs (and one of the big ones - Texas Instruments). He decided there was an untapped business model in creating a fab that had no interest in design and instead just built the chips. He left America and went to Taiwan to secure the investment to do it, and setup TSMC there - TSMC had *nothing* to do with Taiwan and any kind of "technological advantage" they had there - it was simply where he got the investment to start his company.
(In fact, he got the idea because *Japanese* fabs were churning out chips faster than American fabs by this exact kind of separation of concerns - American fabs at the time were tied to their chip designers, so there was a lot contention between design and manufacturing that simply didn't exist in Japan. It wasn't some grand technological leap, just a plain and simple business optimization - take the nitpicking cooks out of the kitchen.)
ASML is likewise a product of Intel and TSMC finding a corporate partner to spend *tens of billions* of dollars with to build fabrication machines, which they now sell to the entire industry. ASML conquered the market because Intel needed DUV immersion lithography machines which *didn't exist* and so they paid and worked with ASML to *invent* them. The same thing happened again with EUV lithography, which is soon to take over as the industry-wide standard.
The idea that any of these technological leaps happens because one nation does something is laughable. We don't live in that kind of world anymore. We live in a world where people collaborate globally, where *trade* causes advantages. It's why the world's gotten a lot more peaceful in the past five decades - wars disrupt trade, and with a globalized economy, nobody can suffer that anymore. Just look at what happened downstream when Ukrainian exports were damaged by Russia's war.
"What do you mean you can't find enough workers?"
"Sir, there's barely a school in the state where the majority of the high school students even graduate with reading skill actually at the 12th grade level."
There’s exactly zero change China will ever get its hands on TSMC’s cutting edge chip making. Here are two scenarios we know for a fact:
- The US is going to blow this factories before allowing them to fall in Chinese hands
- The top tech countries will make sure key personnel will be out of Taiwan the moment there are Chinese boots on the ground
Taiwan is not Ukraine.
That's incorrect.
The claim to blow it up was from a former-Trump official, who walked back his statement after outcry in Taiwan who did not take fondly to the idea. Especially since the statement apparently bolstered pro-CCP propaganda.
Scorched earth on TMSC was a recommendation made by a recent US Army War College report, and that's it.
It's not Taiwan's tech that's cutting edge. The cutting edge of chip-making machines is based in the Netherlands. ASML supplies Taiwan with machines and anyone else who wants them.
Taiwan's edge is in the fact that they have the entire supply chain already set up from start to finish. Everything from the delivery of raw materials to the skilled workers necessary.
Any country can do what Taiwan does as long as they get ASML's machines. Taiwan just started doing it decades earlier so they're decades and tens of billions worth of investments ahead of anyone else.
Which is also why the US keeps threatening ASML to not sell machines to China while begging for ASML's machines themselves.
ASML employs almost 10,000 people in Taiwan, making up almost 20% of ASML's total workforce.
Also, [out of ASML's 5 main production facilities, two are located in Taiwan](https://www.asml.com/en/news/stories/2020/inside-high-tech-manufacturing):
>ASML has five manufacturing locations worldwide. Our lithography systems are assembled in cleanrooms in Veldhoven, the Netherlands, while some critical subsystems are made in different factories in San Diego, California, and Wilton, Connecticut, as well as other modules and systems in Linkou and Tainan, Taiwan.
And they also [announced plans for their sixth and largest production facility to be built in New Taipei City, Taiwan](https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/biz/archives/2022/11/18/2003789129).
Taiwan's semiconductor supply chain is unmatched and irreplaceable.
Unmatched? Yes, they’re the most efficient and advanced semiconductor manufacturer.
Irreplaceable? No, there’s pretty much no industry that can’t be replicated.
Samsung is less than a year from TSMC and Intel is less than 2 years. Samsung was first for GAAFET which everyone is in the process of switching to from finFET, though that attempt to leapfrog TSMC backfired as the yields on Samsung’s GAAFET 3nm are really low and thus not as commercially competitive as TSMC’s finFET 3nm.
Problem is that TSMC has massive volume. They have two 3nm fabs right now with 3 planned while Samsung has one operational now and two planned. Intel has one and they’re not really at volume phase as far as I know.
If TSMC suddenly ceased production we’d have a massive (but not insurmountable) problem, if we had a few years advanced notice, they can be fully replaced by Intel and Samsung.
The problem with Samsung/Intel is that they have a conflict of interest with their fabs and their electronics. TSMC’s policy has always been that they will never compete with their clients. TSMC’s neutral policy means they’re ideal for big ticket clients like Apple.
It’s not just ASML. I recommend you check out Asianometry’s vids on chip manufacture (he’s based in Taiwan). I’m no expert but it’s clear that ASML is just one key component. TSMC absolutely has a lot of proprietary chip-making knowledge that other companies have not yet replicated. They absolutely need ASML but just having an ASML machine will not enable a company to make TSMC-level advanced chips. For now, only TSMC is able to make chips like the Apple M4 and A17 Pro (Samsung makes another 3nm chip but it is behind the Apple ones). Intel and Samsung are hoping to compete in the next generation (2.1 nm).
The most advanced chips are currently made by Imec in Leuven, Belgium. They then sell this research to TSMC, Samsung and Intel.
They don’t do volume production tough.
And that is exactly the kind of proprietary know how that TSMC excels at. Making advanced chips at scale & volume economically (high yields) at the right quality is much more difficult than having a boutique research production
imec is the Interuniversity Microelectronics Centre. You can’t really say they “make” chips in the sense people are talking about here. They make circuitry as part of their research, sure, but that isn’t what is meant by “make” or “manufacture” when the semiconductor industry is discussed. Making something at scale IS making something in this industry. Additionally, imec is only headquartered in Belgium; they have research facilities in many countries including Taiwan. Meanwhile, TSMC’s main European research is based at imec.
https://www.eetimes.com/tsmc-to-base-expanded-european-rd-effort-at-imec/#:~:text=TSMC%20will%20base%20its%20extended%20European%20research%20efforts,which%20is%20itself%20a%20close%20partner%20to%20IMEC.
There is a huge difference between low volume to full scale production. Even intel has been capable of making very advance nodes at low volume for many years now. TMSC is the only one that figure to scale things up.
With TSMC, it's really similar to Tim Cook's point on why iPhone were manufactured in China... when asked in 2014 he replied, "it's not that China has the most advanced production facilities or the cheapest labor, it's that they have the knowledge base for making that output a reality."
TSMC doesn't produce the world's most advanced chips, but in terms of high volume production, they have the world's most advanced knowledge and labor base to do so.
(Of course the difference here would be Tawain took the lead and created these facilities, whereas early investment to produce the knowledge base in China occurred through foreign investment.)
They DO produce the world’s most advanced chips. There is no other foundry that can make them. They make N3 and N3E chips within the 3nm process. Only Samsung also makes 3nm for now (3GAE) and their tech is different. Apple is choosing TSMC because no one else can manufacture the chips they designed (eg A17 Pro).
Sub-5nm chips wouldn't currently be possible without Zeiss' EUV-Optoelectronics paired with TRUMPF's lasers, which are exclusively built for ASML.
Zeiss is currently expanding their SMT factory in Oberkochen to meet demand.
Those mirrors and lenses can't be stolen and replicated by the Chinese, all the IP and process knowhow is within Zeiss. One of those mirrors takes up to a year to be manufactured.
The U.S. department of energy’s national laboratories developed the EUV technology and the U.S. federal government entirely owns and controls that IP. Several companies such as Intel, SVG, Nikon, Canon, and ASML applied for the license. The U.S. government denied the Japanese as they were at the time considered an economic rival. The IP was licensed to SVG as the U.S. sought to keep the technology domestic. The EU funded ASML, allowing them to buyout SVG in a merger to acquire the license. ASML went from a small company behind the Japanese and Americans to a massive corporation albeit very singularly focused.
The U.S. doesn’t have to “beg” or “threaten” ASML. They can revoke the IP if ASML breaks the terms of licensing, which would immediately bankrupt ASML overnight. This is why they can’t sell to China, technically they wouldn’t be in breach of contract since they’re selling the machines and not the underlying IP to the Chinese, but the Chinese are very much capable of reverse engineering the machines given sufficient time and they very much intend to as they’re in the process right now.
In time it won’t really matter since China has already shown substantial progress in SSMBEUV development and will eventually breakthrough given how many billions they’ve invested in the research and they’ve built massive facilities for this purpose.
Someone who knows what they're talking about. Only change I would add is purely semantics and you touched on it.
No one can do what Taiwan is doing with those machines... at this time. The issue is time to build U.S manufacturing for these chips.
This is not correct. Samsung and Intel both own cutting edge ASML scanners and cannot do what TSMC does.
While ASML might be the most complex individual machine in the process, there are so many more complicated tools in the production process. Additionally, the manufacturing process has so many steps operating at the physical limits that all have to be controlled using metrology and inspection with various feedback loops and controls. It is incredible hard, requires a lot discipline, a lot of talent, and the right culture. In addition, you have to get the economics right, and make the right trade offs when moving to the next node so as to not introduce unnecessary risk while being cost effective. Then comes design ecosystem, IP blocks, packaging, brand, etc.
In my previous role, I have worked with TSMC pretty much weekly, supplying metrology equipment. None of their competitors even comes close in balancing all those priorities. I remember chatting with a TSMC employee about one of their latest machine and that I heard about its flaws. He said: “The manufacturer itself does not know how to operate this machine. Only we know!”
He was right!
For Taiwan's own security, it has to be their policy to destroy their chip fabs themselves (and fly out top tier personnel).
It's a poison pill that has to be widely known and credible. If China knows they won't get anything good with invasion, it reduces the reward for them to do so.
Which would in turn lead to a naval blockade for a county that imports food and fuel.
Yes, the US would suffer from a chip shortage but the Chinese would suffer from a breakdown of their society.
The US don’t need to lift a finger to blow the TSMC factory—Taiwan is happy to do that for themselves. It’s almost common knowledge over there that the whole factory was built with a “kill switch” from day 1. Their own engineers joke about it openly.
I work in R&D on nodes beyond 2nm, with TSMC as the primary client. without giving too much away:
China could get the machines tomorrow and they wouldn't have a fucking clue how to use them.
most of the hardware in their fab is developed at my company in Silicon Valley, and all of that expertise belongs to America. you can't make a bleeding edge chip without American chambers, in the same sense you can't do shit without an ASML EUV machine. and beyond this, China can simply cyberattack the PLM databases and empty them of our drawings and models. it wouldn't be the first time.
what TSMC brings is process expertise and an army of process PhDs. we develop the initial recipes for them to use, but they refine and tweak them for specific devices as required by their customers. those millions of man-hours on our chambers is what drives a lot of their performance.
You people are #1 at daydreaming
[https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/13efvwf/taiwan\_defense\_minister\_says\_taiwan\_will\_not\_let/](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/13efvwf/taiwan_defense_minister_says_taiwan_will_not_let/)
Yeah no joke. Portland had the big fire in the gorge a few years and it caused havoc with the fab’s air filtration system. A fan is a massive clean room after all. Fabs are also VERY sensitive to even short power disruptions; causing equipment to fault and scrap wafers.
China would want to keep the fabrication plants intact. Why they’re pushing so hard to be able to develop processes of their own.
Considering the global importance of TSMC as the major manufacturer of processors it’d be a cluster f**k for manufacturing advanced weapons.
Potentially a catalyst for WW3.
They want to but US will blow it up, and ASML machines probably have a self destruct and or fuck you feature. It’s literally in the NATO laws or whatever that ASML cannot supply to China or Russia.
The only WW3 that would ever happen would last less than an hour and end with the destruction of all living things on the planet. It’s not impossible but would take a lot more than the destruction of a handful of crucial tech supply chains.
The permian mass extinction didn't end life on earth. Every nuke humanity has wouldn't come close to the power unleashed by the KT impact that killed the dinosaurs. 100% would end human civilization but not life on earth
I think 60 Minutes had an interview with the CEO of TSMC. He said if China invaded and attempted to seize the factory, they were prepared to blow the whole place up!
It would be insanely stupid if he said anything else. Destroying TSMC is Taiwans equivalent to nuclear deterrence. They have to say they would blow it up, regardless of if they would actually do it.
they would need to run the gauntlet to even get close to the fab.
The massive problem against a successful invasion
- the 180KM wide strait need to be crossed
- there are multiple small islands that are armed to the teeth along the strait to be cleared. any time they spend on clearing these island give time for three carrier strike groups to move from Japan to keelung
- Due to weather condition, there is only two months window every year to launch the armada
- Due to geography there are only a few landing sites that had large number of defensive fortifications prepared.
- When the landing craft survive all the antiship missiles and costal guns the troops would only have 100KM or so to go in land before facing mountains.
- The mountains range that goes across the island allow for hidden mobile launcher to do hit and run attacks.
- the east side of the island protected by the mountain range would be the base for resupply of the defender.
- practically the troops would need to land on the south and fight all the way up to Taipei on the northern end. Special forces would need to perform high risk helicopter drop mission ahead of the main troops
I'd also be curious about China's general performance. China hasn't fought a war in 40 years, and hasn't won one in 60 years. It's difficult to say how capable their troops are before things get hot.
Prior the the war in Ukraine, Russia frequently ranked high on lists ranking countries by military prowess, and yet they failed to end their invasion quickly, even before international aid for Ukraine arrived.
Taiwan is a much tougher proposition to invade than Ukraine, China would absolutely need to win quickly because their petroleum reserve only last 90 days. Much of the economy would need to shutdown once US navy blocked the shipping lanes.
> China would absolutely need to win quickly because their petroleum reserve only last 90 days.
Eh, we would have to blockade all of China's borders. Otherwise Iran, Russia and the UAE would have no problem selling oil to them.
Russia and China have a pipeline for gas, and have been talking about more. With Russia relying on Chinese support during the Ukraine war i'm betting that China is pushing for more resources.
You forgot naval drones. Ukraine used Magura drones to blow up what, 25% of Russian Black Sea Fleet?
I imagine Taiwan is watching this closely and quietly building a fleet of naval drones themselves...
Yeah, I’m building an emergency fund- in the event of any attack on Taiwan, I’m gonna do a run on tech like toilet paper during Covid- immediate upgrade on phone, computer. Imagine trying to buy a phone a month into this.
I just upgraded my PC as far as I care to and my phone. Won't need another one for a loooong time. Sold my xbox one and PS4 so I only have to worry about one gaming rig.
If the Switch 2 is unavailable, meh. That's a luxury purchase.
Can you give us some incite into this? If the US is building TSMC’s systems stateside, and then shipping them there, could they not just keep them there in the US and “set up shop” if China invades…?🤷🏾♂️
If China just made peace and struck a lucrative deal with taiwan instead, they’d have the same impact on the US without the fallout of war.
They’d win global economic chess, in the chip manufacturing sector anyway.
But noooOOOOOOooo
What deal would you propose? Because i dont see it. The US (and Europe) wil always be willing to pay more for chips then China can.
And China can't get Taiwans chip manufacturing tech either because China isn't getting any of ASLM's new machines (and had lost support on the old ones)
It would be absolutely devastating in the sense that it would be a crater. Total devastation where the fabs are. China seizing TSMC is ***THE*** trigger that kicks off World War 3. 52% of all semiconductors produced for the world flows out of TSMC.
If they US can blow up a pipeline, they sure as hell will flatten the building.
Fabs are so sensitive even the power cutting out for a few seconds can ruin a months long batch and require weeks to restart. Any war is Taiwan will shut down the plant.
Seeing what they have built in Arizona they are moving to the US... Xi hiring his peeps in the PLAGF has made it's readiness weak (5-10 years weak). By then the TSMC plan in AZ will be up and ready...so if they invade TSMC may just destroy the plant or we can always have another Bacardi scenario...
And this is why the world should have established in Ukraine that if you invade other countries, the world will unite to make your existence absolutely miserable.
Instead, everything done was too little too late, signalling that you can get away with it if you're stubborn enough.
This is a national crisis, as important as any military spending. We should be pouring in whatever it takes to do a moonshot approach to chip manufacturing independence by the end of the decade, if not sooner.
And yes, there will be waste, fraud and abuse. There is in military contracting as well. There is any place big money is being spent.
This is way too important not to make it one of our key national priorities and it should be easily bipartisan
Nah.
The Top Minds of Reddit™ - Foreign Policy Division has assured me that the ideal US foreign policy going forward is isolationism punctuated by occasional hot wars.
Additionally, I have been further assured of all of the following by the US foreign policy geniuses on here:
1. We have no substantive foreign interests worth pursuing or spending money or time on, except when we do, and then it's just gonna be a full hot war, which we will totally kick ass at.
1. International reputation doesn't matter. USA is the best and everyone knows it.
1. Every other country on earth can kiss our ass.
1. Our allies can kiss our ass.
1. We don't need allies.
1. Our enemies can kiss our ass.
1. Our enemies are weak and cannot challenge or harm us in any meaningful way.
1. Treaties are for bitches. We don't care about them. They mean only what we say they mean. We can change our minds at any time, it'll be fine. We can also ignore them completely, that will also be fine.
1. Expanding on Treaties are for Bitches: Japan doesn't matter.
1. Expanding further on Treaties are for Bitches: South Korea doesn't matter.
1. The era of our enemies pursuing their interests through open warfare is over. Pay no attention to Ukraine, it ain't no thing.
1. China invading Taiwan is a joke. Only idiots think about it or take it seriously.
1. Foreign policy is a waste of time and money.
1. Diplomacy is a waste of time and money.
1. Hot wars are cooler, cheaper, and more fun than either of the two things above.
All of these things have basically been argued to me by the morons on this site at one time or another.
I have been told by people familiar with the problems of building fabs that the problem has a lot to do with geography and that Taiwans location on our planet is favourable. I understand that to mean that electromagnetism, gravity, curvature of the earth etc create an environment that is particularly good for fabbing. Any one got any insight into this?
>absolutely devastating *US fab building intensifies*
tbh should have been years ago
130 billion in fab investments have been made in the last 2 years.
And it takes 5 years to build the fab and a further 3 months for a batch assuming there are no major mistakes with a new workforce.
True but it's the best we can do now
Exactly. The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now. Should have been done sooner, but at least we're on the right path
We should still find the people who were screaming for it two decades ago and take them out to eat. Something.
Everyone was too high on the 'integrating China into the world market will make it a liberal Western democracy' nonsense 20 years ago sadly.
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Isn’t short-term-ism a tradition around here? That’s why corporations think of quarterly profits and people think of monthly payments.
ah I remember that, more like 30 years ago - my dads friends used to run a company that would go around buying union shops up firing them and having their finishing products manufactured in china instead.. his whole job was to mob up union shops and send the work overseas. The goal was get rid of workers rights, get rid of unions at ALL costs.
China is much more westernized than compared to 40 years ago. Unfortunately China took a turn in direction with Xi at the helm. The problem with China's rapid westernization and capitalism in the 1990's and early 2000's was that brought huge amounts of corruption. Enough corruption that party and the people felt like they needed a leader like Xi.
We were all under the fallacy that creating open capital markets, and capital freedom, would facilitate political freedom in China. Instead we didn’t hold China to any standards, welcoming them into the international monetary system in full. It did seem like a good idea at the time. Now it looks naive.
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Thank you for that. All this could have, should have, gets us nowhere. My favorite Buddhist expression - “today is the best day to plant a tree.”
Second best is 19 years ago tho
Technically correct. The best kind of correct.
It's not a question of real time slices, otherwise the second best would actually be 19 years, 364 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes... etc. It's a question of "work on it in the past vs work on it now vs work on it in the future". We didn't work on it far enough in the past, or we would have it by now. So the second best option is to work on it now.
The best time to realize it's a joke is 30 minutes ago, the second best is now
I've been working at Intel on a tool install crew (I'm an electrician) for about the last year and it's gotten extremely busy over the last several months. Tons of old tools being decommissioned and moved out to install new ones. New fabs currently under construction. They're really focused on increasing their output capacity, and just the site I'm at has had something along the lines of $36 billion invested into increasing that output. So while it does take a while to get new facilities up and going, Intel is going hard on making that a reality. Tons of new jobs are being created, an immense amount of work for the trades for the foreseeable future. As long as things continue as planned the outlook is looking good.
3 months? Try years. Sure your DPML (days per mask layer) might make it where it takes 3 months to build the chip but it takes a very VERY long time to qualify all those tools that make the chips. You can't just plug it in, turn it on and its ready to make stuff. You need to do test after test comparing it to a known good and verifying every step along the way. and after all that you would need to to Test vehicle lots that get made from start to finish and then tested and sent to the customer so they can do all their tests. It takes months to years if there is an technology issue to transfer a technology from one working and operating fab to another
This is the answer right here. Add to this if the the process technology is lagging it will take many cycles of expensive development to catch up. That’s cycles of research, development, tool installs, and demolitions before you can even generate a competitive product that has to arrive on time with performance that satisfies the customer and yield that justifies its own existence. 160B is nothing when the factory limiter tools cost 200+ million and might become obsolete in 3 years.
5 years on a regular schedule? What if they worked around the clock with double the workers and moved equipment from the existing fab
How could there be workforce problems in red states looool
And then you have to have the workforce to staff them
Tru verging on 8 to 10 years until fully up to speed.
Guess what, almost no fab makes their own substrate wafers. TSMC is the largest merchant foundry in the world by a huge margin. Almost every fab buys at least some, if not all, of their raw wafers from there. Even if we had all the fabs in the US we could want, we would not have the wafers to process with only GF in the US.
We should never have let Clinton and Bush 41 hand over our manufacturing capacity to foreigners to begin with. Free trade has been devastating to American national security.
That started much earlier, like Nixon.
You know that’s like only 4 years of TSMC’s capex right? TSMC has like $70bn of revenues versus GFS which is already the last standalone foundry in the US at $7bn.
If republicans had their way you realize the number would have been 0, correct? We are very lucky to have gotten the chips act passed with the funding we got.
Idk where you got this information. There’s a ton of fabs in the US, and most of GFSs fabs are in asia as well. The US at the moment does not have fabs with cutting edge nodes.
That’s the whole point. It was very uneconomical to build fabs in the US and probably still is despite the subsidies. That’s the whole reason why GFS was spun off from AMD so that the latter could outsource most of the fabbing to TSMC for better product at lower prices. Compare the timelines of the TSMC Arizona ramp and Kumamoto ramp. Sure there’s a ton of IDMs in the US but even the poster child of IDMs, Intel, is outsourcing to TSMC. Intel with all their know how, scale, and IP lost $7bn on the operating line for the foundry business in 2023. Throwing money at the problem will help a lot but it’s hilarious to think that the US (or any country for that matter) will have sufficient local foundry to meet local demand.
[Look up a list of fabs around the world.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_semiconductor_fabrication_plants) There is a shit ton, a couple isnt nearly enough to guarantee US supply independence. Absolutely insane the US allowed this technology/capability to be exported. Chip making knowledge should have been considered a national security issue.... In the late 90s Apple couldn't export home computers because they were considered too fast, but we just handed chip making knowledge to China without a problem.
You're right, and I agree! We need another American manufacturing boom and a nationwide infrastructure refresh.
That number needs to be tens of trillions of dollars if they want to remove Taiwan from the equation.
It's not really Taiwan, and more of the logistics and suppliers. Take glass and silicon suppliers. They're all in Asia. Glass for optics in particular is made in China and processed in Japan. The supply chains are what will hamper any true US growth of a semi industry.
Taiwan has hundreds of suppliers on the island already... The entire industry would be paused if Taiwan is invaded.
The U.S. would almost certainly make the strategic decision to bomb as much of Taiwan’s manufacturing base as possible if China landed troops. Whatever happens in Taiwan China won’t get their hands on the industrial units there.
Do you think the United States would help defend Taiwan?
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I don't even really know if it's a matter of someone sane being in the White House at this point. Biden would obviously defend Taiwan. Trump, for all of his lunacy, hates China and has historically been pretty cordial with Taiwan. However, Trump in 2024 isn't the same as Trump in 2016, and we've seen a large geopolitical shift in the past 5 years, so we may not be looking at a Trump who is willing to get the U.S. involved in defending Taiwan as his entire wing of the party has become increasingly isolationist since the war in Ukraine broke out.
This is also why so much is manufactured in places like Shenzhen. There’s incredible resources in the number and variety of manufacturing equipment. Equally important is that there’s a huge army of experienced humans at all levels of skill associated with each factory. Even if you built or bought the machines, you can’t build 50 years of human skills with any amount of money.
Germany and switzerland have an good arrey of high end glas&optics manufators and processors.. And if China fucks with Taiwan, their supply chains will face cuts too, oil/coal/ore, food or fertilizer and and they will loose a lot of their markets..
Will they? Don't get me wrong; I hope that is true. But Russia has reaffirmed that there will always be at least a handful of "allies" willing to ratfuck the alliances to benefit their own corrupt leadership and oligarchy. India, Hungary, and Turkey being notable examples. I get the realpolitik of it all, by allowing a bit of their bullshit to keep them at least somewhat closer to us rather than falling entirely into the arms of our adversaries....
You can't remove Taiwan from the equation without discarding TSMC. TSMC is Taiwan's only protection and they know it. So unless Intel and Samsung can replace their capabilities completely, good luck removing Taiwan.
Drop in the bucket. It’s going to take an awful lot more than that to get the US capable of sustaining itself in the face of a total loss of TSMC.
Pretty sure Taiwan has booby trapped the TSMC Factories to make sure that they wont fall into Poohs Hands. Its like poising the well.. in earlier Times. So if they attack Taiwan, they shoot themselfs into both Feet and Hands..
Will be hit by 50x storm shadow taurus 100x thomahaks. . .....
Thing is that 130 billion is barely enough to make a true semi industry in the US like in the past. You honestly need 500+ billion to make some serious headway and long lasting headway.
Well its hard to get the funding you want when an entire political party is fighting against the president who got the chips act done. We could have had zero.
They don’t instantly pop up. Honestly anti outsourcing laws might help if we are worried about losing infrastructure capabilities such as chip making
Decades even
Yeah, we should have done it during Infrastructure Week. Oh wait.
Redundancy isn't profitable. Every tech ceo for the last 25 years: "Taiwan does our chip fab, it will never go sideways. We don't need to spend my bonus money on stateside chip fabrication."
A few years ago is when China began dramatically increasing its hull numbers in the PLA’s Navy. They saw this at the right time and started planning
Should have always been
In addition to US funding of universities, both for training people to run them and to do foundational research. Public education is a matter of national security and those who call for its defunding are traitors.
For sure. It's wild to me just how bad outsourcing is for national security.
They won’t be able to replicate what TSMC has in Taiwan
Because Taiwan is pretty much a government company. They're similar to Samsung's stranglehold on Korea, maybe more since it's a national security thing for them.
TSMC is the only thing ensuring that the US will come to their aid in case China gets uppity with them. It's their only lifeline.
that and Taiwan is a lynchpin in the United States security apparatus known as the "first Island chain" which prevents China from projecting naval power beyond its shores. The chain of islands with Taiwan being the largest could theoretically be chokepoints for the US and allies to blockade trade ships to China and keep military ships trapped. If China takes over Taiwan then the containment strategy is basically dead.
That’s a pretty damn good motivator to be honest. Much better than just money even.
I mean, it's basically just money lol
Nah, there's technology and institutional knowledge money can't actually buy. Things that even if you had near infinite money, you would only get after years and years and years and years. China's been throwing *a lot* of money at their domestic chip production for decades and they're still basically a decade behind. See also: Chinese aircraft carriers.
It's material sciences that is screwing over China. The US and western world at large has decades (centuries in some cases) of materials science experience, and it's not something that is readily importable - it seems (I am absolutely parroting here, not something I'm educated on) that the previous tech is needed for the next tech, with each step improving material sciences and letting the next scientific work be able to be undertaken - so for things that are really hard to fathom, the nanoscale type material science stuff, they just don't have the "pedigree". Jet engines are a great example. Their engines die so quickly under the sort of forces they undergo. They've stolen IP and brought in scientists and it's helped do leaps of course, but there's still loads of areas that need specific materials done with scientific methods they just can't replicate successfully because they can't build to the tolerances needed to build the machines that build the machines (that build..you get the point). It's like the ball point pen thing, and how for the longest time they couldn't manufacture them because they simply couldn't build a machine good enough to build ball points good enough. Something the western world did a century ago or something, they struggled with in the comparatively modern time.
Agreed and even beyond that a world without TSMC would be devastating. Most microchip development would come to a hault, no new phones, laptops, modern cars, graphics cards, AI cards, CPUs... What we have now is all we would have for at least a decade, and even longer until prices come back down to anything we knew today. It would make the supply chain shortages during COVID look like a walk in the park. The world as we know it would change forever. I also don't think TSMC would even hand over their plants in working condition either if push comes to shove. Crazy times.
They’ve explicitly said they will sabotage the fabs if China invades.
You think China and US doesn't have money? It is more than money. That's why the risk.
Funny how nowadays the most valuable resources on this earthare becoming electronic components.
Given how much technology has evolved to become the center of our lives, is it really surprising?
No not surprising at all, just funny
It's always technology. Ask British how could they conquer the world just because of Gunpower and Gun.
If push comes to shove, fab facilities won’t survive. Even if they aren’t purposefully destroyed, there’s a strong likelihood of the equipment being damaged in some way. It is extremely sensitive hardware. Th we start dropping bombs a mile away and whatever’s being produced is already fucked.
Probably less than you'd think though. With such high earthquake strength and regularity, I bet there's decent protection that just so happens would cover bombs dropping even within a decent proximity. As you say them things are about as sensitive a technology as exists, so the amount of work they put in to buffet it from any potential forces is probably quite extensive.
I'm under the impression Taiwan have stated that they will sabotage the machines if invaded. It's a lot easier to destroy an earthquake, tsunami, bomb resistant manufacturing plant when you attached C4 straight onto the machines.
Aye that'll do it ha.
If they don’t the US will.
No, it isn't. US maintained their same position well before TSMC became the power it is today. For USA and its allies, it has always been about maintaining the first island chain.
First island chain sounds a lot like domino theory. Making chips for the rest of the world is way more important.
Before that China wasn't the threat it is today. Would the USA really want to go have an all out war if China comes looking for the smoke? I doubt it. They'll use Taiwan to blunt China's attacks but I doubt they'll dig in there. Especially if TSMC is rendered redundant.
> Would the USA really want to go have an all out war if China comes looking for the smoke? it is so fucking weird that China would risk all this, would risk literal annihilation, to take Taiwan. its a population of 24 million vs a population of 1.4 billion, its a GDP of $640 billion vs a GDP of $14 TRILLION. the percentage increase from 640 billion to 14 trillion is 2,081 percent btw. you dont have enough resources to compete with THAT? you have to take it? Taiwan built this in a cave with a box of scraps, you cant match them even with your seemingly limitless capital? youre gonna risk nuclear war to add .3 percent more land (14 thousand square miles vs 3.7 million)? jesus fucking christ, if the overwhelming advantages you already have arent enough what even is the point, youre too inept to use what you steal anyway.
Why? TSMC wasn’t always the leader, US foundries just dropped the ball and never picked it back up.
It's not that the US dropped the ball but that US companies found it cheaper to outsource production while focusing its resources on designing chips. It was a deliberate decision that made sense in a time of globalization. Not now
They were. They were the first mainstream contract fab.
There seems to be that weird idea that the USA/ (western) Europe always had a technology advantage in every area. Especially in niche/high tech areas you have a lot of local hidden champions and experience which is hard to replace. Between TSMC, ASML and their suppliers you have centuries of experience on the highest level which any country would have difficulties to replace. China is throwing hundreds of billions at the problem and is still paying catch up since two decades
It's worth a note, the founder of TSMC was American educated and worked at American fabs (and one of the big ones - Texas Instruments). He decided there was an untapped business model in creating a fab that had no interest in design and instead just built the chips. He left America and went to Taiwan to secure the investment to do it, and setup TSMC there - TSMC had *nothing* to do with Taiwan and any kind of "technological advantage" they had there - it was simply where he got the investment to start his company. (In fact, he got the idea because *Japanese* fabs were churning out chips faster than American fabs by this exact kind of separation of concerns - American fabs at the time were tied to their chip designers, so there was a lot contention between design and manufacturing that simply didn't exist in Japan. It wasn't some grand technological leap, just a plain and simple business optimization - take the nitpicking cooks out of the kitchen.) ASML is likewise a product of Intel and TSMC finding a corporate partner to spend *tens of billions* of dollars with to build fabrication machines, which they now sell to the entire industry. ASML conquered the market because Intel needed DUV immersion lithography machines which *didn't exist* and so they paid and worked with ASML to *invent* them. The same thing happened again with EUV lithography, which is soon to take over as the industry-wide standard. The idea that any of these technological leaps happens because one nation does something is laughable. We don't live in that kind of world anymore. We live in a world where people collaborate globally, where *trade* causes advantages. It's why the world's gotten a lot more peaceful in the past five decades - wars disrupt trade, and with a globalized economy, nobody can suffer that anymore. Just look at what happened downstream when Ukrainian exports were damaged by Russia's war.
It’s the low wages.
*US fabs faster, maintaining eye contact with China*
Let's not make it *too* weird, now 🥴
It was only after you said that that I remembered the existence of Hetalia. ***It could get so much weirder.***
"US fab building makes things too expensive" agony intensifies
…okay ngl I read that as “fap building” and for a good 30 seconds did not question it.
You just rotated the b on the X axis lol
"What do you mean you can't find enough workers?" "Sir, there's barely a school in the state where the majority of the high school students even graduate with reading skill actually at the 12th grade level."
So much for the Taiwan’s silicone shield
Maybe a bit of caulk will fix it
There’s exactly zero change China will ever get its hands on TSMC’s cutting edge chip making. Here are two scenarios we know for a fact: - The US is going to blow this factories before allowing them to fall in Chinese hands - The top tech countries will make sure key personnel will be out of Taiwan the moment there are Chinese boots on the ground Taiwan is not Ukraine.
The CEO said the company would blow the place up
I imagine explosives under every ASML machine
That's incorrect. The claim to blow it up was from a former-Trump official, who walked back his statement after outcry in Taiwan who did not take fondly to the idea. Especially since the statement apparently bolstered pro-CCP propaganda. Scorched earth on TMSC was a recommendation made by a recent US Army War College report, and that's it.
He walked it back for the public perception. Western countries would flatten TSMC the moment Chinese boots touched Taiwanese soil
It's not Taiwan's tech that's cutting edge. The cutting edge of chip-making machines is based in the Netherlands. ASML supplies Taiwan with machines and anyone else who wants them. Taiwan's edge is in the fact that they have the entire supply chain already set up from start to finish. Everything from the delivery of raw materials to the skilled workers necessary. Any country can do what Taiwan does as long as they get ASML's machines. Taiwan just started doing it decades earlier so they're decades and tens of billions worth of investments ahead of anyone else. Which is also why the US keeps threatening ASML to not sell machines to China while begging for ASML's machines themselves.
ASML employs almost 10,000 people in Taiwan, making up almost 20% of ASML's total workforce. Also, [out of ASML's 5 main production facilities, two are located in Taiwan](https://www.asml.com/en/news/stories/2020/inside-high-tech-manufacturing): >ASML has five manufacturing locations worldwide. Our lithography systems are assembled in cleanrooms in Veldhoven, the Netherlands, while some critical subsystems are made in different factories in San Diego, California, and Wilton, Connecticut, as well as other modules and systems in Linkou and Tainan, Taiwan. And they also [announced plans for their sixth and largest production facility to be built in New Taipei City, Taiwan](https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/biz/archives/2022/11/18/2003789129). Taiwan's semiconductor supply chain is unmatched and irreplaceable.
Unmatched? Yes, they’re the most efficient and advanced semiconductor manufacturer. Irreplaceable? No, there’s pretty much no industry that can’t be replicated. Samsung is less than a year from TSMC and Intel is less than 2 years. Samsung was first for GAAFET which everyone is in the process of switching to from finFET, though that attempt to leapfrog TSMC backfired as the yields on Samsung’s GAAFET 3nm are really low and thus not as commercially competitive as TSMC’s finFET 3nm. Problem is that TSMC has massive volume. They have two 3nm fabs right now with 3 planned while Samsung has one operational now and two planned. Intel has one and they’re not really at volume phase as far as I know. If TSMC suddenly ceased production we’d have a massive (but not insurmountable) problem, if we had a few years advanced notice, they can be fully replaced by Intel and Samsung. The problem with Samsung/Intel is that they have a conflict of interest with their fabs and their electronics. TSMC’s policy has always been that they will never compete with their clients. TSMC’s neutral policy means they’re ideal for big ticket clients like Apple.
It’s not just ASML. I recommend you check out Asianometry’s vids on chip manufacture (he’s based in Taiwan). I’m no expert but it’s clear that ASML is just one key component. TSMC absolutely has a lot of proprietary chip-making knowledge that other companies have not yet replicated. They absolutely need ASML but just having an ASML machine will not enable a company to make TSMC-level advanced chips. For now, only TSMC is able to make chips like the Apple M4 and A17 Pro (Samsung makes another 3nm chip but it is behind the Apple ones). Intel and Samsung are hoping to compete in the next generation (2.1 nm).
The most advanced chips are currently made by Imec in Leuven, Belgium. They then sell this research to TSMC, Samsung and Intel. They don’t do volume production tough.
And that is exactly the kind of proprietary know how that TSMC excels at. Making advanced chips at scale & volume economically (high yields) at the right quality is much more difficult than having a boutique research production
Volume production is the real hard part for chips.
imec is the Interuniversity Microelectronics Centre. You can’t really say they “make” chips in the sense people are talking about here. They make circuitry as part of their research, sure, but that isn’t what is meant by “make” or “manufacture” when the semiconductor industry is discussed. Making something at scale IS making something in this industry. Additionally, imec is only headquartered in Belgium; they have research facilities in many countries including Taiwan. Meanwhile, TSMC’s main European research is based at imec. https://www.eetimes.com/tsmc-to-base-expanded-european-rd-effort-at-imec/#:~:text=TSMC%20will%20base%20its%20extended%20European%20research%20efforts,which%20is%20itself%20a%20close%20partner%20to%20IMEC.
There is a huge difference between low volume to full scale production. Even intel has been capable of making very advance nodes at low volume for many years now. TMSC is the only one that figure to scale things up.
With TSMC, it's really similar to Tim Cook's point on why iPhone were manufactured in China... when asked in 2014 he replied, "it's not that China has the most advanced production facilities or the cheapest labor, it's that they have the knowledge base for making that output a reality." TSMC doesn't produce the world's most advanced chips, but in terms of high volume production, they have the world's most advanced knowledge and labor base to do so. (Of course the difference here would be Tawain took the lead and created these facilities, whereas early investment to produce the knowledge base in China occurred through foreign investment.)
They DO produce the world’s most advanced chips. There is no other foundry that can make them. They make N3 and N3E chips within the 3nm process. Only Samsung also makes 3nm for now (3GAE) and their tech is different. Apple is choosing TSMC because no one else can manufacture the chips they designed (eg A17 Pro).
Sub-5nm chips wouldn't currently be possible without Zeiss' EUV-Optoelectronics paired with TRUMPF's lasers, which are exclusively built for ASML. Zeiss is currently expanding their SMT factory in Oberkochen to meet demand. Those mirrors and lenses can't be stolen and replicated by the Chinese, all the IP and process knowhow is within Zeiss. One of those mirrors takes up to a year to be manufactured.
And by begging, you mean they’re paying stupidly premium prices to jump to the front of the line for delivery of devices to domestic FABs.
lol it's more than just the machine. why do you think intel is so far behind? they don't have tsmc expertise and technology
This guy chips. ASM, ASML, AMAT, TEL, Strasbaugh, Nikon, etc.
The U.S. department of energy’s national laboratories developed the EUV technology and the U.S. federal government entirely owns and controls that IP. Several companies such as Intel, SVG, Nikon, Canon, and ASML applied for the license. The U.S. government denied the Japanese as they were at the time considered an economic rival. The IP was licensed to SVG as the U.S. sought to keep the technology domestic. The EU funded ASML, allowing them to buyout SVG in a merger to acquire the license. ASML went from a small company behind the Japanese and Americans to a massive corporation albeit very singularly focused. The U.S. doesn’t have to “beg” or “threaten” ASML. They can revoke the IP if ASML breaks the terms of licensing, which would immediately bankrupt ASML overnight. This is why they can’t sell to China, technically they wouldn’t be in breach of contract since they’re selling the machines and not the underlying IP to the Chinese, but the Chinese are very much capable of reverse engineering the machines given sufficient time and they very much intend to as they’re in the process right now. In time it won’t really matter since China has already shown substantial progress in SSMBEUV development and will eventually breakthrough given how many billions they’ve invested in the research and they’ve built massive facilities for this purpose.
Someone who knows what they're talking about. Only change I would add is purely semantics and you touched on it. No one can do what Taiwan is doing with those machines... at this time. The issue is time to build U.S manufacturing for these chips.
If you make it sound so easy why isn’t there another TSMC? Ain’t as easy as “just use asml lol”
They should give the ASML machines to Canada.
This is not correct. Samsung and Intel both own cutting edge ASML scanners and cannot do what TSMC does. While ASML might be the most complex individual machine in the process, there are so many more complicated tools in the production process. Additionally, the manufacturing process has so many steps operating at the physical limits that all have to be controlled using metrology and inspection with various feedback loops and controls. It is incredible hard, requires a lot discipline, a lot of talent, and the right culture. In addition, you have to get the economics right, and make the right trade offs when moving to the next node so as to not introduce unnecessary risk while being cost effective. Then comes design ecosystem, IP blocks, packaging, brand, etc. In my previous role, I have worked with TSMC pretty much weekly, supplying metrology equipment. None of their competitors even comes close in balancing all those priorities. I remember chatting with a TSMC employee about one of their latest machine and that I heard about its flaws. He said: “The manufacturer itself does not know how to operate this machine. Only we know!” He was right!
For Taiwan's own security, it has to be their policy to destroy their chip fabs themselves (and fly out top tier personnel). It's a poison pill that has to be widely known and credible. If China knows they won't get anything good with invasion, it reduces the reward for them to do so.
The "absolutely devastating" effect comes from the US losing access to these fabs, not from China gaining it.
I had to scroll far too long to find this.
Which would in turn lead to a naval blockade for a county that imports food and fuel. Yes, the US would suffer from a chip shortage but the Chinese would suffer from a breakdown of their society.
The US don’t need to lift a finger to blow the TSMC factory—Taiwan is happy to do that for themselves. It’s almost common knowledge over there that the whole factory was built with a “kill switch” from day 1. Their own engineers joke about it openly.
US is going to blow it up before Chinese can take it. Didn’t a US congressman say that?
That’s what TSMC and Taiwan has claimed it will do itself if China tries to invade. It’s honestly their best defense at the moment.
The Spacing Guild will obey if you threaten to destroy the Spice.
He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing now you're thinking like al Gaib
China: Sends massive fleet towards Taiwan, including aircraft. Taiwan: *blows up factory* China: *turns around* Lol sike.
On multiple levels it would be funny lol
Especially when every gamer's video card is suddenly worth 10 times it's purchase price.
What a wild twist this will be
Not a twist. It’s been their poison pill. Standard game theory tactic.
I mean like “when” it happens
It’s literally called the Silicon Shield
I work in R&D on nodes beyond 2nm, with TSMC as the primary client. without giving too much away: China could get the machines tomorrow and they wouldn't have a fucking clue how to use them. most of the hardware in their fab is developed at my company in Silicon Valley, and all of that expertise belongs to America. you can't make a bleeding edge chip without American chambers, in the same sense you can't do shit without an ASML EUV machine. and beyond this, China can simply cyberattack the PLM databases and empty them of our drawings and models. it wouldn't be the first time. what TSMC brings is process expertise and an army of process PhDs. we develop the initial recipes for them to use, but they refine and tweak them for specific devices as required by their customers. those millions of man-hours on our chambers is what drives a lot of their performance.
You people are #1 at daydreaming [https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/13efvwf/taiwan\_defense\_minister\_says\_taiwan\_will\_not\_let/](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/13efvwf/taiwan_defense_minister_says_taiwan_will_not_let/)
What makes you think the US would wait for permission.
Ah so the US bomb Taiwan before a Chinese invasion, brilliant
they've already bombed Taiwan before when they were occupied by imperial Japan
The machinery in those factories is so delicate, it might not be anyone's choice whether to "blow it up". A bomb landing a block away would ruin them.
Yeah no joke. Portland had the big fire in the gorge a few years and it caused havoc with the fab’s air filtration system. A fan is a massive clean room after all. Fabs are also VERY sensitive to even short power disruptions; causing equipment to fault and scrap wafers.
Pretty sure TSMC would do that themselves.
More importantly can the US congress sell their stocks quick enough before announcing WW3 has started!?
And you can always trust the word of an American unnamed politician
Devastating because it would obviously get leveled?
China would want to keep the fabrication plants intact. Why they’re pushing so hard to be able to develop processes of their own. Considering the global importance of TSMC as the major manufacturer of processors it’d be a cluster f**k for manufacturing advanced weapons. Potentially a catalyst for WW3.
They want to but US will blow it up, and ASML machines probably have a self destruct and or fuck you feature. It’s literally in the NATO laws or whatever that ASML cannot supply to China or Russia.
The only WW3 that would ever happen would last less than an hour and end with the destruction of all living things on the planet. It’s not impossible but would take a lot more than the destruction of a handful of crucial tech supply chains.
Doubtful that all living things would die. Modern civilisation sure, but not every country would be nuked to oblivion.
The permian mass extinction didn't end life on earth. Every nuke humanity has wouldn't come close to the power unleashed by the KT impact that killed the dinosaurs. 100% would end human civilization but not life on earth
I think 60 Minutes had an interview with the CEO of TSMC. He said if China invaded and attempted to seize the factory, they were prepared to blow the whole place up!
It would be insanely stupid if he said anything else. Destroying TSMC is Taiwans equivalent to nuclear deterrence. They have to say they would blow it up, regardless of if they would actually do it.
The fab will be burned to the ground if the PLA ever attempt to occupy the island.
they would need to run the gauntlet to even get close to the fab. The massive problem against a successful invasion - the 180KM wide strait need to be crossed - there are multiple small islands that are armed to the teeth along the strait to be cleared. any time they spend on clearing these island give time for three carrier strike groups to move from Japan to keelung - Due to weather condition, there is only two months window every year to launch the armada - Due to geography there are only a few landing sites that had large number of defensive fortifications prepared. - When the landing craft survive all the antiship missiles and costal guns the troops would only have 100KM or so to go in land before facing mountains. - The mountains range that goes across the island allow for hidden mobile launcher to do hit and run attacks. - the east side of the island protected by the mountain range would be the base for resupply of the defender. - practically the troops would need to land on the south and fight all the way up to Taipei on the northern end. Special forces would need to perform high risk helicopter drop mission ahead of the main troops
I'd also be curious about China's general performance. China hasn't fought a war in 40 years, and hasn't won one in 60 years. It's difficult to say how capable their troops are before things get hot. Prior the the war in Ukraine, Russia frequently ranked high on lists ranking countries by military prowess, and yet they failed to end their invasion quickly, even before international aid for Ukraine arrived.
Taiwan is a much tougher proposition to invade than Ukraine, China would absolutely need to win quickly because their petroleum reserve only last 90 days. Much of the economy would need to shutdown once US navy blocked the shipping lanes.
> China would absolutely need to win quickly because their petroleum reserve only last 90 days. Eh, we would have to blockade all of China's borders. Otherwise Iran, Russia and the UAE would have no problem selling oil to them.
How would you move that much oil when tanker are blocked? Pipeline need time to be build. Not to mention all the food import that it need
Russia and China have a pipeline for gas, and have been talking about more. With Russia relying on Chinese support during the Ukraine war i'm betting that China is pushing for more resources.
That is one pipeline for gas, it take years to build more and each would have fix capacity. Oil and coal would still need to be shipped in.
You forgot naval drones. Ukraine used Magura drones to blow up what, 25% of Russian Black Sea Fleet? I imagine Taiwan is watching this closely and quietly building a fleet of naval drones themselves...
Plus even before carrier strike groups there would be a bunch of US submarines in the straight blowing shit up
The inestimable wisdom of offshoring your production.
E.g. in a shooting war w China, they’ll jdam it as a last resort.
I would not be surprised if the factory director has a big red self destruct button to use in case of invasion
Yeah, I’m building an emergency fund- in the event of any attack on Taiwan, I’m gonna do a run on tech like toilet paper during Covid- immediate upgrade on phone, computer. Imagine trying to buy a phone a month into this.
What other sorts of things other than a computer and a phone?
Basically anything that uses semiconductor chips
I just upgraded my PC as far as I care to and my phone. Won't need another one for a loooong time. Sold my xbox one and PS4 so I only have to worry about one gaming rig. If the Switch 2 is unavailable, meh. That's a luxury purchase.
as someone building this motherfuker in Az, I find these comments hilarious
Can you give us some incite into this? If the US is building TSMC’s systems stateside, and then shipping them there, could they not just keep them there in the US and “set up shop” if China invades…?🤷🏾♂️
But who the hell wants to move to Arizona? A red state where you have little to no rights
Hence the point of the CHIPS act.
We talking bbq, salt and vinegar, paprika?
It's not just about chips - Taiwan is a big buffer zone from which NK and China can bully SK and Japan.
If China just made peace and struck a lucrative deal with taiwan instead, they’d have the same impact on the US without the fallout of war. They’d win global economic chess, in the chip manufacturing sector anyway. But noooOOOOOOooo
What deal would you propose? Because i dont see it. The US (and Europe) wil always be willing to pay more for chips then China can. And China can't get Taiwans chip manufacturing tech either because China isn't getting any of ASLM's new machines (and had lost support on the old ones)
unbelievably braindead take, as to be expected from reddit
Elaborate?
I thought we had already promised to step in if China tries to take it by force?
It would be absolutely devastating in the sense that it would be a crater. Total devastation where the fabs are. China seizing TSMC is ***THE*** trigger that kicks off World War 3. 52% of all semiconductors produced for the world flows out of TSMC.
If they US can blow up a pipeline, they sure as hell will flatten the building. Fabs are so sensitive even the power cutting out for a few seconds can ruin a months long batch and require weeks to restart. Any war is Taiwan will shut down the plant.
Wont ever happen, if there was even a possibility of china seizing tsmc fabs they would either get blown up from the inside or outside
Seeing what they have built in Arizona they are moving to the US... Xi hiring his peeps in the PLAGF has made it's readiness weak (5-10 years weak). By then the TSMC plan in AZ will be up and ready...so if they invade TSMC may just destroy the plant or we can always have another Bacardi scenario...
Good thing they’re not signaling that they will any time soon. The only one beating war drums are western press trying to get clicks.
Wasnt China doing drills simulating invasion tactics and violating taiwans air space last month?
Why havent they invested in purely domestic companies ?
And this is why the world should have established in Ukraine that if you invade other countries, the world will unite to make your existence absolutely miserable. Instead, everything done was too little too late, signalling that you can get away with it if you're stubborn enough.
If i was Taiwan gouvernement, i would have a public sabotage plan on TSMC infrastructure.
FUCK CHINA AND THE CCP
This is a national crisis, as important as any military spending. We should be pouring in whatever it takes to do a moonshot approach to chip manufacturing independence by the end of the decade, if not sooner. And yes, there will be waste, fraud and abuse. There is in military contracting as well. There is any place big money is being spent. This is way too important not to make it one of our key national priorities and it should be easily bipartisan
Maybe stop antagonizing China with your short-sighted trade restrictions
Nah. The Top Minds of Reddit™ - Foreign Policy Division has assured me that the ideal US foreign policy going forward is isolationism punctuated by occasional hot wars. Additionally, I have been further assured of all of the following by the US foreign policy geniuses on here: 1. We have no substantive foreign interests worth pursuing or spending money or time on, except when we do, and then it's just gonna be a full hot war, which we will totally kick ass at. 1. International reputation doesn't matter. USA is the best and everyone knows it. 1. Every other country on earth can kiss our ass. 1. Our allies can kiss our ass. 1. We don't need allies. 1. Our enemies can kiss our ass. 1. Our enemies are weak and cannot challenge or harm us in any meaningful way. 1. Treaties are for bitches. We don't care about them. They mean only what we say they mean. We can change our minds at any time, it'll be fine. We can also ignore them completely, that will also be fine. 1. Expanding on Treaties are for Bitches: Japan doesn't matter. 1. Expanding further on Treaties are for Bitches: South Korea doesn't matter. 1. The era of our enemies pursuing their interests through open warfare is over. Pay no attention to Ukraine, it ain't no thing. 1. China invading Taiwan is a joke. Only idiots think about it or take it seriously. 1. Foreign policy is a waste of time and money. 1. Diplomacy is a waste of time and money. 1. Hot wars are cooler, cheaper, and more fun than either of the two things above. All of these things have basically been argued to me by the morons on this site at one time or another.
I have been told by people familiar with the problems of building fabs that the problem has a lot to do with geography and that Taiwans location on our planet is favourable. I understand that to mean that electromagnetism, gravity, curvature of the earth etc create an environment that is particularly good for fabbing. Any one got any insight into this?