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Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

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Re: Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

#91

Post by futhey »

FooBarWidget wrote: post #75
bick_nyers wrote: post #54

If TSMC wasn't around, I think it could be argued that China would have tried to take over/invaded long before now. So if you are the government of Taiwan, helping TSMC out is in your best interest.

So are you saying that the US is actively trying to get invaded by moving TSMC out of Taiwan?

I'm not arguing with your point, but the impact moving a small amount of chip production to the US will have.

"Let's just move TSMC to the US" is a naive solution to the problem most people with little industry experience arrive at. No real effort is being made to move any significant portion of final fabrication out of Taiwan and into the US, and the latest and greatest processes are being developed exclusively in Taiwan. Progress on 5nm fabs in AZ will probably be excruciatingly slow, dependent on significant numbers of Taiwanese worker exchanges, and produce a chip 2 generations behind cutting edge by the time it's operational.

There's some backlash in Taiwan over "piercing the silicon shield", but it looks like it could end up being a way to get the US and Taiwan to cooperate even more intensely than they already do.

Re: Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

#92

Post by christophilus »

elteto wrote: post #53
Nokinside wrote: post #3

Semiconductor industry has the deepest and most complex value chain in the economy. TSMC has always been pure fab company and it pays off now. Samsung and Intel are also in chip design business and do other things. They are less focused. TSMC's lead is not guaranteed. Any new technology node can fail and remove them from competition if they make wrong choices. I'm not exaggerating when I say that designing a new tech…

A bit of an aside, but your comment made me realize how much we don’t know about the process used to create the technologies that underpin our civilization. We (laymen) have no idea about the incredible complexity behind manufacturing a single CPU chip.

Reminds me of Jon Blow’s talk about the collapse of civilization:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZSRHeXYDLko&pp=ygUmam9uYXRoYW4...

Re: Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

#93

Post by kroltan »

mst wrote: post #72
elteto wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, how am I overshooting? Reading your comment it seems like we are both in agreement. Or did I read you wrong?

I think they're trying to say that "people don't understand CPUs" is almost over-optimistic given how many much simpler things they don't understand. Would perhaps have been better phrased as "Absolutely true, but it's even worse than that" ass-u-ming I parsed it right.

People in general have a barely functional understanding of computing devices, let alone their operating systems or hardware components, at an usage level.

Their fabrication process is so far removed that I don't think most people would even be able to know where to look for the information, even if they could access and understand all of it.

Re: Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

#94

Post by rowls66 »

throwaway2990 wrote: post #44
psychphysic wrote: post #11

Taiwan has invested in it like it was it's military. And it worked, they got to the point that the US would defend them from a Chinese invention.

The US has been an ally of Taiwan since before the CCP existed.

Before the CCP existed, Taiwan was part of China, and was occupied for many years by Japan. After the Chinese civil war and the rise of the CCP, the defeated nationalist government moved to Taiwan. It is only then that any US alliance with Taiwan began.

Re: Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

#95

Post by jamiek88 »

SigmundA wrote: post #26
rayiner wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The important thing to understand is that at the level of chip manufacturing, you’re doing advanced materials science. These aren’t just abstract logic gates and structures built out of them, such as SRAMs. At the manufacturing level, the logic gates are nano-scale 3D structures made of different materials and in different shapes. For example, at this scale, the shape of the transistor gates has a big effect on perfo…

It's also important to note how crazy the ASML EUV machines are, they each take a megawatt of power to produce about 100 watts of EUV. The infrastructure just to run these machines is staggering. TSMC uses about 5% of Taiwans total power I believe.

Physical size as well! The machines are two stories high!

Like a bus stood vertically on its nose.

Re: Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

#96

Post by qorrect »

elteto wrote: post #70
qorrect wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are really overshooting. Most people don't even know where their water comes from. Most people that drive do not know how a combustion engine works. Even people watching TV are only vaguely aware it's a series of static images chained together to make it look like its moving.

Wait, how am I overshooting? Reading your comment it seems like we are both in agreement. Or did I read you wrong?

Yes I'm agreeing with you, I think the situation is much worse than that though.

Re: Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

#97

Post by NeverFade »

Eisenstein wrote: post #37
sigbottle wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the difference between HBS ideas and these Asian companies? I have no background in economics so idk. Like what advantages do both have? From this comment it reads like HBS has no merit at all but I'd imagine that's not the entire picture

Business schools teach efficiency. Efficient as in 'put in a dollar, what gets you the most back in the shortest time period?' It is oriented to appeasing stockholders (investors), who want to see earnings grow. If your company is losing money, cut cost centers and maximize revenue to up the profits for the quarter so that the stock doesn't go down. This usually means cutting jobs, defunding research, and making thin…

> It is oriented to appeasing stockholders (investors), who want to see earnings grow.

This strategy appeases short-term shareholders, at the cost of significantly penalizing long-term holders. It's not a simple case of "appeasing shareholders".

Re: Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

#98

Post by kortilla »

chasil wrote: post #52
deepnotderp wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a made up explanation because: 1) All RnD fabs move wafers 24/7 2) Intel has consistently been the leader in process technology for 20+ years. Why did this “3x shift advantage” deliver gains only in the past 5 years?

What would cause the VP of R&D to make such a false claim? Also see his discussion of copper interconnects, which they delivered first, even before IBM. He also concedes that Intel has led in "transistor performance," and they have never been equaled. The interview also goes into the later scandal of his employment at SMIC, so he is a controversial figure, without doubt.

>What would cause the VP of R&D to make such a false claim?

Winning in a complex business environment is very frequently both intentionally and unintentionally misattributed by the winner.

Re: Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

#99

Post by Eisenstein »

NeverFade wrote: post #97
Eisenstein wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Business schools teach efficiency. Efficient as in 'put in a dollar, what gets you the most back in the shortest time period?' It is oriented to appeasing stockholders (investors), who want to see earnings grow. If your company is losing money, cut cost centers and maximize revenue to up the profits for the quarter so that the stock doesn't go down. This usually means cutting jobs, defunding research, and making thin…

> It is oriented to appeasing stockholders (investors), who want to see earnings grow. This strategy appeases short-term shareholders, at the cost of significantly penalizing long-term holders. It's not a simple case of "appeasing shareholders".

Maybe I should have said 'stock traders'?

Re: Ask HN: Why is TSMC so competitive in semiconductor fabrication?

#100

Post by epups »

bunnie wrote: post #85
epups wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering the overall investment goes into dozens of billions, it seems a little hard to believe they wouldn't source worldwide talent to make it 24/7 as well. Also they probably source top talent. I'm always skeptical of those "we just work a little harder" explanations.

Except in manufacturing, getting your yield up and tuning a process is basically 'just work'. You define a space of parameters you want to explore and then you brute force it by building samples at each parameter step and then analyzing it. This can be pipelined and parallelized to some extent, but then you have to convince enough PhD level employees to do night shifts, because each process step is basically a miniat…

I just think that if TSMC can find such PhD level employees in Taiwan, why couldn't other competitors find them in places way more abundant in those types of people? Convincing them is a matter of paying them more, there are plenty of highly educated physicians who work night shifts. And it's not like TSMC could hide this secret sauce either, so you would think that before dumping another 20 billion in a new investment, Intel would consider simply replicating what they could easily observe from TSMC.
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