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South Korea to spend $1T on more memory chip production and humanoid robots

arstechnica.com

71–80 of 223 posts

Re: South Korea to spend $1T on more memory chip production and humanoid robots

#71
post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Realistically, when it comes to the semiconductor market, there aren't many viable options outside of East Asia. I don't mean this in the sense that East Asians were somehow "chosen," but rather that the semiconductor industry inherently requires a large number of highly educated employees working together. The problem is that the working hours inevitably end up being very long. If you actually go work at one of thos…

I believe some of the earliest Intel fabs were in New Mexico (Shiprock and Rio Rancho). What combination of the above did New Mexico have? When New Mexico and Germany had fabs, South Korea was still a developing country ruled by a brutal dictatorship. What happened was simple - both Taiwan and South Korea and now China took concerted steps in investing into their semiconductors businesses. South Korea did this indire…

I'm not saying Asian culture is the main factor. Yes, it's true that authoritarian governance driven by dictatorial regimes and chaebol politics has played a strong role, but fundamentally, the long working hours are simply inherent to this business.

You brought up the New Mexico story quite well, but that place is notorious for the exploitation of Navajo women's labor. In the first place, the factory was occupied and shut down by the American Indian Movement. You know full well that this is a story about the exploitation of Native Americans, so why are you bringing it up like that?

The history of Shiprock itself is, at its core, a history of "cheap, obedient labor." You frame it only as state-led investment, but the reality is that the culture behind it is complex.

What my post is pointing out is not that "Asian culture is superior." What I'm pointing out is the harsh working conditions in Asia — where working hours are extremely long, and even highly educated workers are inevitably subjected to grueling hours. Why do you think TSMC's Arizona fab in the U.S. keeps getting delayed? The U.S. invested money through the CHIPS Act, but American engineers refuse to accept the "military-style 24/7 on-call readiness and brutal shift work" that exists in Taiwan. TSMC founder Morris Chang himself has pointed this out before.

What I'm saying is that the educational infrastructure is so well-established that it's easy to produce a large supply of highly educated workers, and that these highly educated workers then have to be submissive to inhumane working conditions. This isn't about Asian superiority — it's actually pointing out something bad about Asia. But from the context of your comment, it seems like you misunderstood me as saying "Asian work culture is superior" and replied based on that assumption. That was never my intention.

Before you leave a comment, I'd ask you to show some basic respect to others.

Re: South Korea to spend $1T on more memory chip production and humanoid robots

#72
post #28

I wonder how Germany missed the semi manufacturing train? They had literally everything: universities, manufacturing culture, expertise and supporting supply chains, cash. I forgot, they also had ASML, freaking next door!

> I wonder how Germany missed the semi manufacturing train? My best guess is that the connecting train was operated by the Deutsche Bahn

lmao

Re: South Korea to spend $1T on more memory chip production and humanoid robots

#74
post #49
post #17

The title sounds to me like: I am going to spend $1000 in groceries and dance lessons. That is, two very different things lumped together. Memory chips are like groceries, essential commodity parts, a no-nonsense investment. Humanoid robots are like dance lessons, it is cool, it is sexy, and it may pay off in the future, but the value is much less certain.

I’d say it’s more like “on groceries and a fancy dinner”. Humanoid robots sure do need RAM, both in data centres for training and in the robots themselves. :)

Vertical integration. Produce the chips, build data centers to run LLMs on the chips, and the robots to deliver the result to end users.

Re: South Korea to spend $1T on more memory chip production and humanoid robots

#75
post #56
post #17

The title sounds to me like: I am going to spend $1000 in groceries and dance lessons. That is, two very different things lumped together. Memory chips are like groceries, essential commodity parts, a no-nonsense investment. Humanoid robots are like dance lessons, it is cool, it is sexy, and it may pay off in the future, but the value is much less certain.

$585B on new fabs, $357B on AI data centers, and $5.8B on humanoid robots. One of those numbers is not like the others

[dead]

Re: South Korea to spend $1T on more memory chip production and humanoid robots

#76
post #56
post #17

The title sounds to me like: I am going to spend $1000 in groceries and dance lessons. That is, two very different things lumped together. Memory chips are like groceries, essential commodity parts, a no-nonsense investment. Humanoid robots are like dance lessons, it is cool, it is sexy, and it may pay off in the future, but the value is much less certain.

$585B on new fabs, $357B on AI data centers, and $5.8B on humanoid robots. One of those numbers is not like the others

Androids (humanoid robots) will require loads of ram, and loads of model training under the current paradigm. So it sort of makes sense. At least, I see robots as the top of the pyramid.

Re: South Korea to spend $1T on more memory chip production and humanoid robots

#77
post #17

The title sounds to me like: I am going to spend $1000 in groceries and dance lessons. That is, two very different things lumped together. Memory chips are like groceries, essential commodity parts, a no-nonsense investment. Humanoid robots are like dance lessons, it is cool, it is sexy, and it may pay off in the future, but the value is much less certain.

The value is pretty clear. The problem is the pay off is uncertain.

Re: South Korea to spend $1T on more memory chip production and humanoid robots

#78
post #17

The title sounds to me like: I am going to spend $1000 in groceries and dance lessons. That is, two very different things lumped together. Memory chips are like groceries, essential commodity parts, a no-nonsense investment. Humanoid robots are like dance lessons, it is cool, it is sexy, and it may pay off in the future, but the value is much less certain.

> Humanoid robots are like dance lessons, it is cool, it is sexy, and it may pay off in the future, but the value is much less certain

They need a solution to their plummeting birthrates which are officially worse than either China’s or Japan’s

Re: South Korea to spend $1T on more memory chip production and humanoid robots

#79

I wonder how Germany missed the semi manufacturing train? They had literally everything: universities, manufacturing culture, expertise and supporting supply chains, cash. I forgot, they also had ASML, freaking next door!

The Germany fetish still going strong I see.

Re: South Korea to spend $1T on more memory chip production and humanoid robots

#80
post #51

I wonder how Germany missed the semi manufacturing train? They had literally everything: universities, manufacturing culture, expertise and supporting supply chains, cash. I forgot, they also had ASML, freaking next door!

Realistically, when it comes to the semiconductor market, there aren't many viable options outside of East Asia. I don't mean this in the sense that East Asians were somehow "chosen," but rather that the semiconductor industry inherently requires a large number of highly educated employees working together. The problem is that the working hours inevitably end up being very long. If you actually go work at one of thos…

I’ve always wondered what is unique about semiconductors that PhDs need to work like assembly line workers. I’m sure they’re not solving partial differential equations all day, but what’s so different between different batches of chips?
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