3 ms·

Can anyone comment on this industry? Is it a good idea for a college student today to try to study a major related to chip fab? What majors are those? Are they

Can anyone comment on this industry? Is it a good idea for a college student today to try to study a major related to chip fab? What majors are those? Are they actually offering competitive jobs, or is this more of "Americans just don't want to work anymore!"

opportune 3y ago
I got some recruiter spam to work for TSMC about 1-2 years ago. They wanted to pay something like 80 or 90k/y (a fraction of my pay which a recruiter should know) and have me do like 6mo of training in Taiwan. I don’t know what their criteria were for sending out that spam but no, if they were targeting experienced engineers at well known large US tech companies, it was not at all competitive and made me think they didn’t know how to hire here.
- fooker 3y ago
  That’s actually a solid idea if you’re a US citizen and starting out in the industry. Get the training, work for them for a year and so and then to to Intel or whoever the US govt is funding to be competitive.
ImAnAmateur 3y ago
I can't comment on the pay, but from what I gather the leadership at TSMC is terrible. There's a plethora of firsthand accounts that you can find on places like Glassdoor.
- FirmwareBurner 3y ago
  >what I gather the leadership at TSMC is terrible But if leadership is terrible how are they the no. 1 player in the world?
  - refurb 3y ago
    I assume by "leadership is terrible" they mean how it impacts working there, not the business results.
    - FirmwareBurner 3y ago
      I see, but most companies worldwide tend to optimize for business results at the expense of employee satisfaction. Only that the US skilled jobs market is so good that employees get pampered in comparison to employees in other markets.
sweetjuly 3y ago
There is quite a bit of domestic fabrication in the US but Intel is really the only cutting edge player anymore. Many of these other fabs are not really interested in changing their processes (in fact, they are heavily disincentivized to!) because their margins are not particularly high and so being low cost and high reliability are their only goals. This can be extremely frustrating to people knew to the field since, after toiling away for years and years on your PhD, everyone is telling you not to change anything and to just keep things working as they are. If you get into Intel, you might get to do some really cool work, but that's quite a risk to bank your entire career on IMO (especially given that nobody pays that well either). So, yes and no. Fab is neat but realistically if you like chips I'd really encourage you to go for VLSI and/or some other EE specialty since the US does have plenty of high paying demand from many companies for these positions.
iancmceachern 3y ago
My experience in this industry is that it is not very kind to it's employees and contractors It's very boom and bust, between the big companies and contractors they employ they hire and fire thousands on yearly time scales. Long hours and mindless dedication to put in a lot of hours despite big misses by management leading to lots of cancelled half finished projects. Lots of work double time and weekends for 3 months and then they just shut it down anyway and expect you to find another job. In my experience other tech industries, particularly in the bay area, things like big tech, med tech, etc. are much better fields for technical professionals to get into
brutus1213 3y ago
I don't think these are competitive jobs ($$ wise) .. if I was advising a student, software and AI are the future.
lithos 3y ago
Chip makers never seemed to have figured out the bullwhip effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect , and I would personally guess intentionally as a way to purposefully keep workers fearful (as serious layoffs are guaranteed every couple of years during slow periods, meaning during worker-squeeze periods you obey or end up first to be gone in a year).
meltyness 3y ago
Horrid. It's a kickback sheme too probably, directors collude to clamp hiring to "the cream of the crop" which is basically no one, while the other 2 outfits benefit from monopsony and an influx of cheaper talent they can make investments until their own situation gets dire, and let hiring breathe again. A sort of autoeconomic career cycle dysplasia. Most of these jobs are only open if you went to college, decided 2 years in that you wanted to work at one of these joints, worked in a lab for 4 years to get your masters, had excellent grades, and your PI was a friend of a friend. HR just assumes like 99% of the population is deranged.

opportune 3y ago

I got some recruiter spam to work for TSMC about 1-2 years ago. They wanted to pay something like 80 or 90k/y (a fraction of my pay which a recruiter should know) and have me do like 6mo of training in Taiwan. I don’t know what their criteria were for sending out that spam but no, if they were targeting experienced engineers at well known large US tech companies, it was not at all competitive and made me think they didn’t know how to hire here.

fooker 3y ago
That’s actually a solid idea if you’re a US citizen and starting out in the industry. Get the training, work for them for a year and so and then to to Intel or whoever the US govt is funding to be competitive.

ImAnAmateur 3y ago

I can't comment on the pay, but from what I gather the leadership at TSMC is terrible. There's a plethora of firsthand accounts that you can find on places like Glassdoor.

FirmwareBurner 3y ago
>what I gather the leadership at TSMC is terrible But if leadership is terrible how are they the no. 1 player in the world?
- refurb 3y ago
  I assume by "leadership is terrible" they mean how it impacts working there, not the business results.
  - FirmwareBurner 3y ago
    I see, but most companies worldwide tend to optimize for business results at the expense of employee satisfaction. Only that the US skilled jobs market is so good that employees get pampered in comparison to employees in other markets.

sweetjuly 3y ago

There is quite a bit of domestic fabrication in the US but Intel is really the only cutting edge player anymore. Many of these other fabs are not really interested in changing their processes (in fact, they are heavily disincentivized to!) because their margins are not particularly high and so being low cost and high reliability are their only goals. This can be extremely frustrating to people knew to the field since, after toiling away for years and years on your PhD, everyone is telling you not to change anything and to just keep things working as they are. If you get into Intel, you might get to do some really cool work, but that's quite a risk to bank your entire career on IMO (especially given that nobody pays that well either). So, yes and no. Fab is neat but realistically if you like chips I'd really encourage you to go for VLSI and/or some other EE specialty since the US does have plenty of high paying demand from many companies for these positions.

iancmceachern 3y ago

My experience in this industry is that it is not very kind to it's employees and contractors It's very boom and bust, between the big companies and contractors they employ they hire and fire thousands on yearly time scales. Long hours and mindless dedication to put in a lot of hours despite big misses by management leading to lots of cancelled half finished projects. Lots of work double time and weekends for 3 months and then they just shut it down anyway and expect you to find another job. In my experience other tech industries, particularly in the bay area, things like big tech, med tech, etc. are much better fields for technical professionals to get into

brutus1213 3y ago

I don't think these are competitive jobs ($$ wise) .. if I was advising a student, software and AI are the future.

lithos 3y ago

Chip makers never seemed to have figured out the bullwhip effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect , and I would personally guess intentionally as a way to purposefully keep workers fearful (as serious layoffs are guaranteed every couple of years during slow periods, meaning during worker-squeeze periods you obey or end up first to be gone in a year).

meltyness 3y ago

Horrid. It's a kickback sheme too probably, directors collude to clamp hiring to "the cream of the crop" which is basically no one, while the other 2 outfits benefit from monopsony and an influx of cheaper talent they can make investments until their own situation gets dire, and let hiring breathe again. A sort of autoeconomic career cycle dysplasia. Most of these jobs are only open if you went to college, decided 2 years in that you wanted to work at one of these joints, worked in a lab for 4 years to get your masters, had excellent grades, and your PI was a friend of a friend. HR just assumes like 99% of the population is deranged.