Live data from Hacker News

Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

nytimes.com

141–150 of 657 posts

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#141

If Intel got $8.5B how come the stock didn't go up? https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/INTC/

They didn't get the money. Reading the article, the first sentence explains this is just a proposal...but even the commerce.gov headline is misleadingly worded (to your point).

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#142
post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a re-shoring of strategic capabilities not a labor move. The labor will most likely be imported as it doesn’t really exist in the US at the scale needed with an eventual eye towards more domestic labor. Expect large numbers of imported skilled labor in the short term.

The text of the bill [^1] disagrees with this: > In awarding financial assistance for planning or establishing a Manufacturing USA Institute, an agency shall give special consideration to such institutes that > contribute to the geographic diversity of the Manufacturing USA program, > are located in an area with a low per capita income, > are located in an area with a high proportion of socially disadvantaged residen…

Oh yes, the bill has all kinds of nice ideas in it.

But then there is reality. And reality is that there isn’t some giant labor pool of fab workers in the US — yet.

- President Joe Biden signed the CHIPS and Science Act into law one year ago, and semiconductor companies across the U.S. have promised to spend $231 billion on building chip manufacturing hubs on American soil.

- Now, as the shovels hit the ground to begin construction, companies are realizing how difficult it is to find talent.

- Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company said it had to delay production at its $40 billion Arizona plant due to a lack of workers in the U.S.

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/08/09/us-chip-sector-talent-gap-em...

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't really a startup kinda business. It costs something like $10b to build a new fab.

Isn’t that what they said about rockets?

The big difference there is SpaceX was able to incrementally build up. Falcon 1, Falcon 9, Falcon heavy, Starship. Each step allowed them to prove that it worked and gain investors and government contracts.

Who in their right mind would invest $10b just to build the manufacturing capability without having a well established product? And if you have a well established product are you still a startup?

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#144
post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, you can chase short term profit and send your designs off to TSMC, or you can own your own foundry. This is exactly why it's in the interest of the US government to ensure that Intel doesn't totally abandon US manufacturing just like AMD did years ago.

Not saying INTC isn't valuable - just saying they seem to have missed the boat in a big way and changes are in order. The US does of course need on-shore chip foundries for strategic reasons.

Pat Gelsinger only returned 3 years ago, it just takes a while for changes to propagate through an org as large as Intel.

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#145
post #79

Right now one of the biggest blockers in on-shoring semiconductor fab at any kind of reasonable price-point and timescale is the lack of a skilled workforce. This legislation has dual objectives: train new people to get into sophisticated manufacturing AND to build out the actual infrastructure itself. That almost guarantees it won't be the most efficient way to actually get these chips on American soil. Whether we l…

I don't think Intel is going to train a new skilled workforce. Their domestic hiring is minimal. Like the rest of tech these bills are leveraging work visas that ensure the Corp has feudal control over their workers. The right thing to do is to block these big waves and force global competition.

Who would the competition be between?

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#146
post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This just sounds like how we got into our current mess with Boeing.

You're not wrong, but having an incredibly important dependence on an industry 100 miles off the coast of China (and the target of their increasingly erratic dictator) is worth paying billions to break.

This short-termism seems like it's been America's chief problem through the centuries.

"We need slavery - our economy will fall apart without it!"

"We need Standard Oil and US Steel - splitting them apart would be a catastrophe!"

"We need universal healthcare - a public option would place undue burden on insurance companies!"

"We need Boeing - our foreign competitors would eat us up otherwise!"

At some point, it's time to admit that the long-term pain is not worth the short-term benefits we get from naive economic policies.

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#147
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The new CEO banned buybacks. I never understood the anti-dividend and anti-buyback mindset. I've given quite a bit of money to partially own a business (and I don't mean publicly traded shares, but literally buy a portion of a business). I have an agreement with the operator that I'll get N% of proceeds (as long as the business can handle that percentage). Are you saying that I, as an owner, am not entitled to it? Th…

> I never understood the anti-dividend and anti-buyback mindset. I'll try to explain it. Companies use stock buybacks to give away massive amounts of capital. Capital that they clearly need for their long term health. Then, because they're important to the economy when they have a downturn they come to taxpayers and ask for massive amounts of cash. This is for example what happened to the airlines which then got over…

You start a business and have partners who have bankrolled you. They own a percentage of the company. At some point, you want to buy out their share. But the government just banned it. You can only dilute your share, never increase your ownership stake.

Does that make sense? Because that's what banning stock buybacks will achieve.

> Companies use stock buybacks to give away massive amounts of capital.

It's one use of stock buybacks, amongst many. Companies also do buybacks to get a greater ownership stake. They also do it if they think their stock is undervalued.

Banning buybacks is throwing all good options out to prevent a few bad options. It's a kneejerk reaction.

My company has done buybacks multiple times. It barely made any impact on the stock price. The much believed notion that it manipulates stock prices ... needs hard data. Look at all the companies who've done it in the last 30+ years - how many of them saw a significant gain in stock price in the short term?

I can agree that these transactions need to be regulated. But banned? Nope. For me, though, reform is useless unless they solve the problem I mentioned above: That it is currently legal for me to get an ownership stake in a company and not be entitled to anything in return. Shareholders should have a contractual right to returns that is independent of the stock price.

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#149

We're living through the silicon age and Intel has made a total dog's breakfast of it. Stagnant revenues, falling profits. Both should have been growing geometrically. Just compare these companies: https://valustox.com/INTC https://valustox.com/AMD https://valustox.com/AVGO https://valustox.com/AMAT Even Qualcomm has seen good growth: https://valustox.com/QCOM This is how it's done: https://valustox.com/NVDA EDIT the…

No shock that profits are failing when they are investing heavily

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#150
post #79

Right now one of the biggest blockers in on-shoring semiconductor fab at any kind of reasonable price-point and timescale is the lack of a skilled workforce. This legislation has dual objectives: train new people to get into sophisticated manufacturing AND to build out the actual infrastructure itself. That almost guarantees it won't be the most efficient way to actually get these chips on American soil. Whether we l…

Or we are going to be training Junior engineers with outdated skill sets and build outdated infrastructure. Sometimes top down planning works, but I think I would personally need to trust the leadership and the incentives. Unfortunately incentives on these are typically to do bare-minimum so you can meet the criteria to get subsidies. Sure the chips will be usable, but you spent a multiplier of the cost it takes to g…

> the chips aren't cutting edge.

We learned from the pandemic that a huge amount of the world's manufacturing economy depends on the availability of old and outdated chips. Being competitive in cutting edge CPUs and GPUs is only one facet of the problem. Incrementally addressing chip production needs seems better than doing nothing for longer in an attempt to solve everything at once, or a riskier leapfrog attempt that's likely to fail.

Post reply on HN