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Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

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Re: Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

#91

Post by markus_zhang »

burnished wrote: post #13

Ok, this article quietly gets fucking wild halfway through. >> Samsung spent years evaluating where to build the new fab, courting multiple locations and pitting them against each other for better incentives. But the ultimate decision came down to Samsung Group's leader Jay Y. Lee, who was granted early parole in August expressly to speed up crucial business decisions like the Texas chip fab. Accounting for between 1…

I bet some part of the US government has something to do with all these things. It's just we will never know until the change of tide.

Reference: Propaganda Due was not exposed until the end of the cold war.

Re: Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

#92

Post by hermes8329 »

jakeinspace wrote: post #43
ethbr0 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, people forget the amount of IP (including semi design) that goes from the world to China/Taiwan to design products. But that's what the whole point of free trade is supposed to be: increased interdependence, so that everyone has a gun to everyone else's head, and no one is incentivized to pull the trigger.

China can manage with loss of most or all access to American/NATO IP. America/NATO can't really manage without Chinese imports.

They just steal the IP anyways

Re: Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

#93

Post by 0_____0 »

josaka wrote: post #69

After the TX grid failure last winter, it's probably not a coincidence that Samsung's new facility will be near ERCOT's operation center in Taylor, which manages the TX grid, and will likely be the last load to shed when the grid's stressed. Used to work in the Austin fab, and the amount of money lost per minute in a power failure is mind boggling. The tax breaks Taylor offered ($314m) are not that different from wha…

tangentially related bit of trivium... when i was house hunting a looked at a house across from a fire station, and upon doing research about what it's like to live across from one, found that a.) they tend not to blast sirens upon exiting the station, in contrast to living near a hospital with an ED, and b.) the power grid segments that fire stations are on have priority and are less likely to lose power during blackouts.

Re: Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

#94

Post by hermes8329 »

HideousKojima wrote: post #44
dfsegoat wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same situation. Most of South Koreas infrastructure / urban centers would be decimated in an 'all out' conflict with North Korea. [1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelpeck/2020/08/11/north-ko...

In particular, all of Seoul is in artillery range of the north

Rusty dusty equipment that probably won't even fire.. that offensive line is hardly a major threat

Re: Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

#95

Post by ethbr0 »

jakeinspace wrote: post #43
ethbr0 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, people forget the amount of IP (including semi design) that goes from the world to China/Taiwan to design products. But that's what the whole point of free trade is supposed to be: increased interdependence, so that everyone has a gun to everyone else's head, and no one is incentivized to pull the trigger.

China can manage with loss of most or all access to American/NATO IP. America/NATO can't really manage without Chinese imports.

That's not accurate today. It might be different in 10 years, depending on how successful China is at becoming self-sufficient in semiconductor design and manufacturing.

Global companies didn't just outsource all the work to China. Even in the 90s, they were aware of the risk/reward, and specifically retained high-value, low-headcount/capital work outside of China.

As a result, China makes most of a device, but many core components are imported.

https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/huawei-revenue-slides-in-q3-...

Re: Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

#96

Post by cronix »

This is a great first step. The more fabs that are built here, the more supply chains that feed them will follow. Supply chains tend to follow the manufacturers where feasible. This will eventually improve things even more for the other high tech companies in the state as they do move supply chains closer to production. Texas has been making some pretty substantial long term investments in the last few years. If you don't plant trees today, you won't have shade to sit beneath 20 years from now. The best time to start is often yesterday. These things take time and a great deal of capital and I'm glad to see some places are moving forward.

Re: Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

#97

Post by edge17 »

fabfabfab wrote: post #45
lkbm wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(Also not an expert.) In general I wouldn't expect US manufacturing to do a lot to lower production costs. More capacity in general obviously helps, and I could definitely see the US doing a lot to subsidize domestic production, if that counts as bringing down the costs. Maybe higher wages will lead to more automation.

Expert here. Worked in a Fab (Automated Material Handling Systems or AMHS group). You might be suprised how automated it already is [1]. Notice the OHTs (Overhead Hoist Transport)[2] running on a system of highways and superhighways on the ceiling. Each of these OHTs carry a box inside it called a FOUPs (Front Opening Unified Pods)[3] carrying upto 25 wafers. That can easily be worth $1M+ per box. They have standardi…

For someone interested in robotics and automation, what types of groups/jobs would one look for specifically in this industry? Also geographically where are these types of jobs located?

Re: Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

#98

Post by trasz »

sleepysysadmin wrote: post #46
bnt wrote: post #2

So everyone is on the "Let's build a Fab in the USA" train, will that eventually bring down the chip production costs? (not an expert in the field, so asking naively)

This is about the war with china. Europe: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/tech-is-make-or-break-i... Germany: https://www.infineon.com/cms/en/about-infineon/press/press-r... Korea: https://fortune.com/2021/05/13/south-korea-chip-semiconducto... Japan: https://www.aroged.com/2021/11/23/japan-has-allocated-5-2-bi... Non-OP USA: https://9to5mac.com/2021/06/09/us-chip-production-52b/ Key players are expecting an all…

The easiest (and probably the only) way to prevent a war with China is to convince the US to not start it.

Re: Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

#99

Post by fabfabfab »

guai888 wrote: post #18

‘Impossible':TSMC founder Morris Chang on US dreams for onshoring chip supply chain https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/4327937 Morris Chang spent 25 years (1958–1983) at Texas Instruments.He knows US very well.

Having worked in Fab, the supply chain is already in the US+EU+Japan. About the only change in last 5 years or so is Intel's ability to compete in lithography process and get sufficient yield to stay competitive in pricing. Lithography is one of the 400 or so steps in Fab processing, but arguably the most critical and a bottle neck. TSMC does not have a lead in every single of these 400 steps, in fact quite the opposite.

Anytime someone says "impossible", I would take that opinion with a grain of salt.

Re: Samsung plans $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas

#100

Post by markus_zhang »

JavaBatman wrote: post #11

I am still amazed by the shortsightedness of how these critical and strategic goods are off-shore. No wonder why the supply chains are fragile and not robust. It should be illegal for strategic goods and components such as chips and semiconductors to be produced offshore. Yes, it will raise prices in the short and medium-term, but it will make the domestic economy and manufacturing sector more robust, resilient to su…

When you start thinking about politics/geopolitics from an "interest group" perspective, instead of a national perspective, you will understand all these. "Nation" is just a concept that we put up together as a "framework". It means a lot for common people like us because we simply have nothing else to rely one, but not much for different interest groups (I'm talking about banking, military, lobbyists, industrial conglomerate, those big shots).
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