71–80 of 120 posts
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Auto manufacturers can't just put in a general purpose CPU. Embedded CPUs have functionality general purpose CPUs don't have. Not to mention it would take months to design new hardware and write new software. The chips being put into cars today were selected at least 5 years ago.
One Raspberry Pi in every car and problem solved.
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you mean like how TSMC is building a fab in arizona and samsung in texas?
I think they have a Chinese move against Taiwan more on the mind than an earthquake or other natural disaster.
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It might even be a good investment to build a fab just to clean up in the event of a shortage. Kind of like how if anyone in Texas had the good foresight to winterize they could have made a year of profit in a few days...
> Kind of like how if anyone in Texas had the good foresight to winterize they could have made a year of profit in a few days... Hmm. When would this foresighted person have made their preparations? What would installation have cost? What would maintenance have cost? More or less than a year's worth of profits?
As I read elsewhere (don't have the link) this is supposed to be the #2 chip supplier for the automotive industry, and the #1 and #3 closed down because of the Texas Power outage and are still not operational. Anyone know more?
You read it here: https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Tech/Semiconductors/Chip-st... Some more details on the NXP texas fuckup: https://outline.com/rfBWzn
Ouch. That suggests that they didn't have backup power for the positive pressure ventilation system. I hope adding that is on someone's todo list for next time.
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I'm not sure we should be so quick to fault them. The unemployment rate when the pandemic really started building up steam was absolutely staggering so a lot of people quite reasonably expected a severe recession along with severe contraction of consumer demand to follow. That we didn't experience one is a minor miracle (and printing of a ridiculous amount of money).
Yes you can, and here's why. The high unemployment rate during the pandemic was(and still is) mostly formed of people working in the service industry, travel, minimum wage earners and people with little to no skills and those people were having a rough time even before the pandemic so they were never on the automakers' radar of customers would buy a new car, not in a million years. Those people can only afford to buy…
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It might even be a good investment to build a fab just to clean up in the event of a shortage. Kind of like how if anyone in Texas had the good foresight to winterize they could have made a year of profit in a few days...
> Kind of like how if anyone in Texas had the good foresight to winterize they could have made a year of profit in a few days... Hmm. When would this foresighted person have made their preparations? What would installation have cost? What would maintenance have cost? More or less than a year's worth of profits?
Power that's selling right now for $25/MWh was selling at the $9,000/MWh cap. A 36,000% increase in price can surely pay for enough to, say, keep your pressure sensing equipment from freezing over. (Which is why the 1,280MW STNP Unit 1 went offline at a $11.5MM/hour+expenses cost.)
Not to mention the lives and property damage that might have been spared.
> When would this foresighted person have made their preparations?
As far as _when_, maybe after the 2011 TX cold snap that took generation offline for similar reasons. Or the one in 1989.
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I think they have a Chinese move against Taiwan more on the mind than an earthquake or other natural disaster.
I would imagine that some DoD plan states that all those fabs in Taiwan get blown up upon invasion.
Ships would be inspected and food and medicine will be allowed through but all trade goods will be blocked.
But that is all depended on the US and it's allies having a stomach for a naval confrontation or that the Chinese mainland umbrella of long range missiles and air defense can be an effective deterrent against that.
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Having worked in the semiconductor industry, it would be good investment for Apple, Google, or Microsoft to get into fabbing stuff for themselves and others just on the basis of being able to outcompete everyone else in operational efficiency. There's a killing to be made from low-hanging fruit all over the place, at least for anyone who's able to front costs of opening or acquiring a billion dollar fab.
> it would be good investment for Apple, Google, or Microsoft to get into fabbing stuff for themselves and others just on the basis of being able to outcompete everyone else in operational efficiency. They can try... Surely they have cash, and so did the Chinese who were signing 10 digit cheques for anybody claiming to be able to setup a modern fab. Running a fab is not like running a cat video website, or making a c…
You're squaring up against a stickman. The companies cited are not fly-by-night startups "running a cat video website". Dave Cutler got his start on the factory floor, working out better processes for a toilet paper manufacturer. Apple has plenty of hardware chops and the vertical integration bug. Google shook up telecoms by scaring the shit out of the industry incumbents (although they could have stood to get their hands dirtier, Cutler-style[1], and stay in the game).
Although none of this is necessary. The fruit hangs so low here that all it would take is someone half competent who can see the enormous gains to be had by just not doing so many things in the dumbest way possible. This isn't bleeding edge stuff. We're talking catching up on things that that wouldn't even be considered state-of-the-art 25 years ago. Hell, they could start just by drastically cutting back on how many hires they source from the defense industry and have had their minds warped by (and numb to) the bureaucracy and bottomless budgets from that world.
> if there is a company which can turn off the lights on a dotcom companies like them, it will be a big fab business
Not a chance. The semiconductor industry, perversely, has no idea how to put computers to use, and the leadership and organizational structures are aligned against that kind of achievement ever coming from within (or being airdropped in by a leadership hire who cuts across the lanes from another industry) and making the top-down sweeping changes that would be required.
As someone who has had to endure over a year of very close to the metal (in this case, imagine centuries old, gnarly, rusty random pot metal, maybe) development on a Renesas platform, I'm tempted to think "fewer Renesas products? Awesome!!" but obviously that would be childish. I'm sorry for all the people hurt by this, fire is no joke. Edit: added missing words.
And yet I completely agree with you. Probably because I've also experienced their products and their... unique... design-in challenges.
My deepest sympathies to all the people impacted by this.
My [extremely impolite words redacted] to the company.
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>Automakers were already struggling with chip supply TBH, that is their own fault. When the pandemic started a year ago, they chickened out thinking people won't have money to buy anymore cars and halted production, cancelling orders for semiconductors. Then, when the demand for cars exploded, since nobody wanted to be on a subway/bus full of people carrying a contagious virus, they wanted their chips to resume produ…
I'm not sure we should be so quick to fault them. The unemployment rate when the pandemic really started building up steam was absolutely staggering so a lot of people quite reasonably expected a severe recession along with severe contraction of consumer demand to follow. That we didn't experience one is a minor miracle (and printing of a ridiculous amount of money).
Now they know the concert is definitely on, they want their place in the line back and the manufacturers told them to pound sand, since there are tons more people paying more money than they are.
Automotive manufacturers think they have much more weight than they actually do when it comes to purchasing electronic components. They definitely came to a rude awakening when the chip fabs and manufacturers told them to go to the back of the line.
For reference, the entire automotive market in 2020 spent 38 billion on semiconductors. Apple alone spent 53 billion in 2020.
If you are going to prioritize something, who do you think is going to get special treatment?