Live data from Hacker News

Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

electronicsweekly.com

391–400 of 593 posts

Re: Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

#391

It will be clear that this money was wasted within ten years. What a government needs to do to attract real manufacturing entrepreneurs: - pro family policies (for people) - pro immigration (for people) - cut environmental laws (for capex make-right) - cut business taxes (for gm make-right) - cut personal taxes (for people) - fight back against china-sponsored economic maneuvering at the multilateral level (to create…

And watch as your fledgling local business dies due to hundreds of billions of subsidies for foreign fabs. South Korea alone is subsidizing Semiconductors with $450Bn [1]. If you want local fabs, you need to spend money. Or you get to watch your automotive assembly lines stop because of chip shortages.

[1]: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-13/korea-unv... [1 Non paywalled]: https://archive.ph/9Gs8q

Re: Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

#392
post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> more interconnectedness = less % chance of war What evidence do you have to make this claim? A simple thought experiment proves the counter. Let's say there is a population on one island, and another population on another island, and these populations have no way of reaching each other or even knowing of each others existence. These not-connected populations are guaranteed not to go to war. However, give one of the…

If you like ad absurdum arguments: if you connect the countries together so much, they eventually decide to become one country and the chance of war goes down, not up (excluding civil war)

I don't think they like ad absurdum arguments. But without systematic evidence, there is not way to determine if if such an argument is actually any less valid then the initial claim.

Re: Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

#393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems to me that most software is horribly inefficient anyway. If push came to shove we might just consider making better software?

It's depressing how bloated and slow some software is despite running on way faster machines. The software engineering accomplished in the 90's was nothing short of astonishing.

No, it wasn't. It was passable. The software "engineering" "accomplished" today is just nothing short of pathetic.

Re: Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

#394

It will be clear that this money was wasted within ten years. What a government needs to do to attract real manufacturing entrepreneurs: - pro family policies (for people) - pro immigration (for people) - cut environmental laws (for capex make-right) - cut business taxes (for gm make-right) - cut personal taxes (for people) - fight back against china-sponsored economic maneuvering at the multilateral level (to create…

Germany hasn't been doing any of that except immigration, and it has fared exceptionally well over the last decades. Taiwan's chip industry is the result of massive subsidies that got it started.

Re: Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

#395
post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The world doesn't revolve around "America vs Russia". There are lots of other things going on. And if you are looking for a mass murderer, is there a bigger mass murderer than USA after 20 years of mass murder in the Middle East?

Yes it doesn't revolve around America vs Russia You have to consider the EU vs Russia. It's not in EU's or Germany's intrest to keep trading with Russia

It is though, they get something like 40% of their gas from Russia, and 30% of oil imports.

It is immensely in the interest of Germany to have good relations and continued trade with Russia.

Re: Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

#396
post #2

Investing in local chip fabs is long overdue. These are incredibly important for geopolitical stability and should be distributed world-wide. We've centralized too many fabs in too few places in the search for low cost.

>> Investing in local chip fabs is long overdue.

Nah, this is a bargain. Rather than chasing the technology for 50 years, they just waited until it's already mature (2nm may be the end of the road?) and spend a few billion after all the development has happened elsewhere. BTW Germany is already home to some fairly advanced non-EUV fabs with Global Foundries.

Re: Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

#397

What is even funnier is that Intel has plenty money and is profitable and dividend paying even though nearly all of Intel's fabs are in the US (and thus suffering from the high cost level compared to Asia is a part justification for these subsidies).

They lost $ 20 billion in the last year.

Re: Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

#398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hm, "decades" implies GDR ... AMD eventually bought some of Robotron's facilities, though.

Possibly. But start of 2000 when AMD and Infineon in Dresden where in vogue is also more than a decade ago.

True. I like to avoid thinking that way. It makes me feel old.

Re: Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

#399
post #326
post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was the main argument for global trade already in 1914. France was Germany's most important commercial partner, and vice-versa. All German rifles had stocks made from French walnut wood! All French locomotives had German-made tubing! This stupid mantra was repeated ad nauseam after 1991, too, with silly op-eds from Friedman and friends about how two countries with McDonald joints in both can't be at war and simi…

McDonald's is now leaving Russia. A local company is taking over operations there and will operate under a different brand name. https://www.npr.org/2022/05/16/1099079032/mcdonalds-leaving-...

The McDonald's leaving thing was always totally absurd to me for this reason. There are real examples of economic dependence that could and do cause problems. The owners withdrawing ownership though is a pure benefit to Russia. Threemployees get paid by the customers and get supplies from suppliers and all of that is totally unaffected. The only thing that changes is they pay less money to American buisness owners, so if anything, pay might go up or prices might drop as less is skimmed off the top.

Re: Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

#400
post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's about national security. A fab is necessary for national security

Subsidizing an American company is not necessary for Germany's security. In fact, it undermines it.

I mean, the fab is physically in Germany. That's what matters for national security.

As an American, would I (hypothetically) rather have a Germany company building F-35s in the US than an American defense contractor building F-35s in Indonesia? I think the answer is obviously "yes".

Post reply on HN