A lot of that technology is secret and needs to be developed in house, or with closely partnered companies. So a big part of that cost is the r&d needed to ke

A lot of that technology is secret and needs to be developed in house, or with closely partnered companies. So a big part of that cost is the r&d needed to keep current. In any given generation, one fab will have the best tech, and another the second best, and all the other fabs have compete on price at a tiny margin or just sit that generation out and make cheap chips with thier existing machines while hoping to catch the next wave. That means it's an industry got the deep pockets. You need to be able to take a huge loss and keep investing to stay in the game. So it's basically Intel, and sovereign wealth funds teamed up with interventionist states like Singapore and Taiwan ... The US and other western countries had and lost this industry because of free market idealism.