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

nytimes.com

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

#231

Post by jiveturkey42 »

TremendousJudge wrote: post #183
nyokodo wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Whether we look back in 20 years and think "wow glad we took that hit upfront" is anyone's guess Globalization is breaking down quickly. Chips are crucial to national security and our economy. The supply chain for advanced chips is heavily dependent on East Asia which is a geopolitical powder keg and a demographic time bomb. The only thing more expensive than whatever we end up with is chips unavailable at any pric…

>Globalization is breaking down quickly Is it? I don't know if there's a concrete way of measuring "amount of globalization", but I'd guess that right now we're probably the most globalized we've ever been. "More things that you use are made outside your own country" has only been growing, and with the advent of full remote companies that also includes much more software than before -- it used to be that only huge co…

You could proxy a measurement of "amount of globalization" by disruptions in global shipping of food, energy, manufactured goods, etc. Covid caused disruptions, Houthi attacks in the Suez Canal disrupted shipping, Panama Canal is facing issues with water due to drought.. US continues to withdraw from Naval security commitments from the Bretton Woods era

Physical goods are much more complicated to move around the globe than code

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

#232

Post by UncleOxidant »

rhelz wrote: post #132

WRT to lack of a skilled workforce, here is an interesting anecdote. I remember back in the late 90's, Intel had to fire most line workers in their FABS, and hire people with Ph.D.'s in solid-state physics. I actually knew one of these people who were fired: She was our housecleaner. And--like the supper-smart garbage man of the Dilbert Cartoons, she was very smart. Smarter than me. I know because she helped me solve…

Aren't the vast majority of line workers in a fab people with a bachelors degree (or less)? The process engineers might be PhDs, but not most of the folks working in the fabs. Also, fabs are becoming more and more automated, so less people are needed overall.

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

#233

Post by lotsofpulp »

sfilmeyer wrote: post #116
hollywood_court wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine we’d have that skilled workforce if companies paid enough. I’m a former construction contractor who reinvented myself as a software developer. Each time I run into one of my former peers in the construction industry I hear the same complaints from them. “We can’t hire any good help.” Yet they are still paying the same non living wages that they have for 30 years.

I don't think that dynamic is the same in construction and in semiconductor manufacturing. Certain parts of the chip-building supply chain just plain don't exist in the USA, and so no one in the USA currently has those skills. It's not like there are lots of folks with the skills in the USA but they're all leaving the industry for higher paying jobs.

The reason there are not a lot of folks with the skills in the USA is because 30 years ago, the US labor market did not appropriately reward those parts of the chip building supply chain. Same dynamic as not paying construction workers enough, just with a greater time lag.

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

#234

Post by s1artibartfast »

gamepsys wrote: post #224
lenerdenator wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The goal of a corporation is to generate value for shareholders, and we don't give any incentives for them to do otherwise.

Corporations should only return cash to investors (via dividend or stock buyback) if they do not have a high yield way to invest the money internally. A large stock buyback is the corporation admitting they do not have good uses for the cash. If Intel would take these grants, tax credits, and low interest loans and turn around and increase their dividend or do a large stock buyback then this would be a simple wealth…

I'm not sure if this was your intent, but it sounds like you're describing the world as it actually works.

Companies execute stock BuyBacks when they don't have better internal Investments, and that's a good thing!

Intel doesn't care about more us-based Fabs, nor are they high yield. This is why the US government has to pay them if the US government wants those things to exist.

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

#235

Post by zer00eyz »

nyokodo wrote: post #94
icyfox wrote: 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…

> Whether we look back in 20 years and think "wow glad we took that hit upfront" is anyone's guess Globalization is breaking down quickly. Chips are crucial to national security and our economy. The supply chain for advanced chips is heavily dependent on East Asia which is a geopolitical powder keg and a demographic time bomb. The only thing more expensive than whatever we end up with is chips unavailable at any pric…

>> Globalization is breaking down quickly.

Food. Fuel.

Renewables is shifting one of these, but the other will not go backwards, its that or billions will starve.

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

#236

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

rhelz wrote: post #132

WRT to lack of a skilled workforce, here is an interesting anecdote. I remember back in the late 90's, Intel had to fire most line workers in their FABS, and hire people with Ph.D.'s in solid-state physics. I actually knew one of these people who were fired: She was our housecleaner. And--like the supper-smart garbage man of the Dilbert Cartoons, she was very smart. Smarter than me. I know because she helped me solve…

Intel became the biggest sponsor of EE H1Bs in this time frame. They were trading competent citizens for compliant serfs.

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

#237

Post by aylmao »

lenerdenator wrote: post #151
exabrial wrote: post #139

Oh good, another bunch of board members can now afford their yacht club memberships for 2024. These handouts need to stop.

The alternative is to be dependent on the rest of the world for chips. The market decided that the most efficient transaction is to offshore all of this infrastructure to geopolitically-compromised areas and pray that China never does what every other emerging power in the history of geopolitics has done. The market chose wrong.

> pray that China never does what every other emerging power in the history of geopolitics has done.

I am curious what you mean by this precisely. What other emerging powers have done what?

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

#238

Post by RobotToaster »

curiousllama wrote: post #165
eitally wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a silly anecdote and I have a hard time believing chip fab line workers are too much different from those in other types of high-tech (where I spent 15 years working on test automation & quality systems). Some smart folks, for sure, but almost zero roles required even actual engineering background. A lot of management had strong technical education, but the vast majority of line workers are just following simp…

Having seen a few 'high tech' places myself: there's high tech, and then there's _high tech_. Assembling a motherboard is to semiconductor fabs as flying a toy drone is to landing a Boeing 747. One you can learn in an afternoon; the other takes years to learn.

> Assembling a motherboard is to semiconductor fabs as flying a toy drone is to landing a Boeing 747.

A 747 can pretty much land itself on autopilot.

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

#239

Post by BeetleB »

Aromasin wrote: post #194
no_wizard wrote: post #106

Wouldn't GlobalFoundries (HQ in New York and supposedly on the "Trusted Foundry" list) have made more sense, since they fabricate chips for multiple different companies, where as Intel only makes them for Intel? Boosts a competitor, opens up fab capacity for all and moves the needle on the intentions behind the CHIPS act, all at once.

GlobalFoundries are nowhere near the leading edge on node process, and Intel have opened up their foundries to customers since Pat's return with the advent of IFS: https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/foundry/overview.htm...

Correction: Intel has had a Foundry business since 2010 or 2011. Then CEO Paul Otellini pushed hard for it, but had a lot of opposition internally. It then languished after he left until Pat took over.

It never died. It was always there. Pat's just fulfilling the vision Paul had.

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

#240

Post by resource_waste »

lupusreal wrote: post #89
resource_waste wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Top down planning is the only way projects requiring massive capital investment get done. There's no such thing as grassroots fabs.

The top down planning could be profit driven rather than defense driven.
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