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Europe bets once again on RISC-V for supercomputing

theregister.com

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Re: Europe bets once again on RISC-V for supercomputing

#111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the goal is to decouple from the U.S., why would the EU want to collaborate with a totalitarian state like China?

Because RISC V results would be something the Europeans could produce? We are reliant on the US as only 2 companies can make the x86/64 chips. I don't think Europe would be completely against working with a US or Chinese company like Hi Five/Star Five, as long as we weren't dependent on them, and could pull ties if they abused their position of control.

STmicro is producing chips at around 14-18nm. ASML is the one producing the leading lithography machine, and we are not talking about ARM, Infineon or NXP. Europe has the capacity to produce their own processors if needed.

Re: Europe bets once again on RISC-V for supercomputing

#112
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ARM is a British company. We are in Europe.

It was founded in Britain, but it is a Japanese company ATM as per it's SoftBank ownership.

So what? Japan are Europe's enemy now? Could the EU not just buy 25% or something?

Re: Europe bets once again on RISC-V for supercomputing

#113
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The US can probably consider most-all ARM IP to be dual use technology and immediately deny use of it. The US (certainly the current US) can do that, but ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arm_Holdings ): “Arm Holdings plc (formerly an acronym for Advanced RISC Machines and originally Acorn RISC Machine) is a Japanese-owned British semiconductor and software design company based in Cambridge, England”

ARM in stock listed in New York, it cant avoid US assertions

So what, there's nothing done in America that can't be brought back to Cambridge or London just as easily as we offshored it.

If Europe is making a serious investment then it has more than enough power to say "you'll get the contract if you divest of X,Y,Z"

Re: Europe bets once again on RISC-V for supercomputing

#115
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US is extremely chaotic and unpredictable. China is fairly stable and predictable.

This is it. China might be authoritarian, but it's acting way less eratic than the US right now.

"right now" being the key phrase here. On what length of time due you judge stability? The last 75 years or so in China... well amoung other things they killed over 50 million of their own people with a man made famine. The question is if the institutions that produced USA can hold. China on the other hand lacks the self correcting mechanisms that USA has built in.

Re: Europe bets once again on RISC-V for supercomputing

#116
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't the supplier of lithography machines for TSMC Dutch? While that's not the entire process, and it would be a 20 year endeavour, it seems like funding the development of local capability here would be eminently doable. Europe is also the current heavy hitter for fundamental physics research, so attracting talent and maintaining an ecosystem should be much more achievable.

Manufacturing the processor itself is different issue from what architecture that processor will be. If Europe produces any consumer processors like that it wont be x86. It will be Risc-V (maybe arm? its UK but owned by Softbank so nope)

Just because SoftBank own it now, do you really think if Europe went to it and said "can we buy half, if so we'll buy $X amount of licences otherwise we'll start (effectively) a serious competitor in risc-v.

Re: Europe bets once again on RISC-V for supercomputing

#117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Simple: China is only totalitarian in western propaganda. "Yellow Peril" is a tired trope, it's a democracy. It's difficult to characterize the U.S. as a democracy, and our social progress is rolling backwards.

I'm very impressed and fascinated by the Chinese society and their progress. I love the country and it's rich history. But is it a democracy? No not according to my idea of what that word means. It's a great country nonetheless, people are free in China, they have their own system and it works for them, good! Why pretend it's a democracy?

It's worth debating because China describes itself as such: http://en.moj.gov.cn/2024-03/05/c_967573.htm

The Chinese would say the point of democracy is to translate the will of the people into action, it's to efficiently solve problems that people have, it's in their understanding neither liberal nor representative. In fact they'd likely turn your question around, if democracy is merely a set of procedures or rituals without concerns for the will of the majority, the demos which is in the name, why do you pretend to be one?

Re: Europe bets once again on RISC-V for supercomputing

#118

China recently moved that direction. That would be nice collaboration to see between EU and China. China to publish policy to boost RISC-V chip use nationwide, sources say https://www.reuters.com/technology/china-publish-policy-boos...

If you ignore the military ambitions of China and the fact they’re openly sharing technology with Russia, perhaps.

I don’t see anything but regret for Europe several decades from now if they decide to start providing China with the technical expertise they’re currently lacking in this space.

This is all about China trying to find a way to escape the pressure of sanctions from Europe and the US.

Re: Europe bets once again on RISC-V for supercomputing

#119

China recently moved that direction. That would be nice collaboration to see between EU and China. China to publish policy to boost RISC-V chip use nationwide, sources say https://www.reuters.com/technology/china-publish-policy-boos...

If the goal is to decouple from the U.S., why would the EU want to collaborate with a totalitarian state like China?

Because if the US are aligning with Russia and shunning Europe, then it makes sense for Europe to partner with China and break them off from Russia/USA

Re: Europe bets once again on RISC-V for supercomputing

#120
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was founded in Britain, but it is a Japanese company ATM as per it's SoftBank ownership.

So what? Japan are Europe's enemy now? Could the EU not just buy 25% or something?

Its specifically Softbank which might be japanese but its very much aligned with US and VC funds. It might as well be VC fund.
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