31 ms·
TSMC, Bosch, Infineon, NXP to jointly build semiconductor fab in Europe
- baybal2 3y agoThat's an interesting development. I can't fathom how TSMC would've let Infineon+NXP into the deal without some level of positive, or negative coercion. For Germany, it's an insurance against TSMC possibly bailing out in the future. The 22nm node is also a very strange choice. It's absolutely not a thing which most of German industry needs, which are microcontroller, high voltage, mixed signal, niche memory, and ASIC friendly nodes.
- kzrdude 3y agoWhich are these ASIC friendly nodes?
- crote 3y ago40nm-ish. IO logic doesn't really scale, so going much beyond that doesn't really make sense when the price per mm2 keeps increasing with every node. If your logic is simple enough that it doesn't really benefit from the increased transistor count or power savings, IO is going to be the main factor when it comes to node selection.
- arlcode 3y agoThey are getting 5bn to build this fab. That gives the government some leverage.
- crote 3y ago> I can't fathom how TSMC would've let Infineon+NXP into the deal without some level of positive, or negative coercion. Easy: Infineon is German, NXP is Dutch, Bosch is German. Germany is not exactly going to give a massive subsidy to a foreign company, but giving one to local companies is "bolstering local economy". And TSMC gets a fab at a 50% discount out of it.
- sirius87 3y agoWonder if the Taiwanese govt at some point will step in and block these onshoring measures as a matter of national security. If countries are less reliant on manufacturing within Taiwan, its one less reason to stand up to Beijing's one China principle.
- JumpCrisscross 3y agoYou don’t see how that would immediately produce blowback? Is Congress going to say “oh shucks” and authorise another weapons deal? Or might they redirect those dollars domestically while reducing patrols of the Taiwan Straits?
- sealeck 3y agoIt's extremely unlikely for the US to do that as if China takes Taiwan it will be a huge blow to the US and to the value of being a US ally.
- andrewstuart 3y agoThey probably figure it’s better to be the one doing it than someone else.
- christkv 3y agoA much better strategy is to work slow :). Drag out every phase.
- christkv 3y agoAlso ASML has a super long backlog I think so even if they build it they would have years to wait to even get and install the equipment
- thiago_fm 3y agoMore like the opposite, by making ties with other countries, Taiwan will win some geopolitical points. TSMC alone has no control over if the Chinese government will commit such aggression, if they would do their whole company strategy based on fearing the CCP, there's no way they can be successful.
- thiago_fm 3y agoGreat to see they coming to Germany. If Tesla could build a car factory here from scratch, I'm sure that they can build chips too. Curious why they've chosen Dresden though. Anybody knows how much the government is willing to invest? Missing some tangible figures.
- Kelteseth 3y ago> Curious why they've chosen Dresden though. Because many foundries are located there like GlobalFoundries and Bosch
- thiago_fm 3y agoMakes sense. Thank you!
- pipo234 3y agoEindhoven (NL) would have been obvious as well (NXP, ASML, Infineon, Philips)
- arlcode 3y agoGermany is a big player (politically and financially) in the EU and the Eurozone and it's benefitial to have them on your side. (Also such a large economy can offer better (aka larger) subsidies if they want to)
- TotempaaltJ 3y agoEindhoven is also still growing: https://siliconcanals.com/news/startups/dutch-smart-photonics-bags-100m/ https://siliconcanals.com/news/startups/dutch-smart-photonic... Much smaller though! It's probably good for the EU in general to have multiple silicon hubs.
- AdamN 3y agoGermany wouldn't have subsidised that one though - this was German money.
- 3y ago
- AdamN 3y agoSort of incredible that Germany is getting decade old technology for this much investment.
- formerly_proven 3y agoGloFo Dresden next door does 22nm FDSOI already
- r0b1n 3y agoThe likes of Bosch/Infineon/NXP are not interested in bleeding edge fabs, they sell embedded CPUs from very old fabs they still have. So this is an advancement for them, and totally sufficient for embedded stuff.
- baybal2 3y ago> totally sufficient for embedded stuff. No, TSMC 22 has no eFLASH, expensive SRAM, lacking of analog capability, lacks high temperature tolerance, and is tied to multiple patterning design flow. TSMC 40 on the other hand is the last portable node, with MRAM, eFLASH, high temp, some mixed signal, RF, no MP, and everything else your soul desires.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- r0b1n 3y agoDidn't know that. Maybe they'll add the missing parts as chiplets?
- 55873445216111 3y agoInfineon Aurix microcontrollers on TSMC 28nm have eFlash and RRAM available as NVM. https://www.infineon.com/cms/en/about-infineon/press/market-news/2022/INFATV202211-031.html https://www.infineon.com/cms/en/about-infineon/press/market-...
- arlcode 3y ago
- spdy 3y agoJust out of curiosity how hard would it be to re-fit such a foundary to modern <5nm cpu fabs with ASML/Zeiss directly around the corner.
- theK 3y agoThere is a YouTube channel called asianometry which did some videos about UV lithography. Form what I remember the processes vary significantly in each generation so that there probably is little to no real overlap. I'm no expert though so might be off by a mile here.
- crote 3y agoLiterally impossible. You don't re-fit a fab, you build it from scratch. There is very little technological overlap where it matters due to the shift to EUV. You'd essentially have to scrap >75% of the fab to fit in the new equipment.
- RF_Savage 3y agoNot only that, but the fab undergoing the 2 - 5 year refit would also not be in full production capability. So there is the revenue loss in addition to everything else. and suddenly just building new makes even more sense.
- hospitalJail 3y agoNot everything needs cutting edge chips. Heck, I can use crappy chips for every home appliance and home IOT device. Sure I want high end stuff for my laptop so I can do AI, but that is just 1 application.
- RF_Savage 3y agoYep. If you spend 5 years building a fab, then it will definitely be run on maximum utilization for as long as possible. Things like microcontrollers thrive on the 180nm to 28nm nodes. And even 74HC series logic chips are still being manufactured by Texas Instruments and Nexperia (former NXP/Philips). All fab capacity gets used.
- nntwozz 3y agoJust want to share these relevant videos from Asianometry: How Semiconductors Ruined East Germany https://youtu.be/cxrkC-pMH_s https://youtu.be/cxrkC-pMH_s Why Europe Lost Semiconductors https://youtu.be/5ZdmS-EAbHo https://youtu.be/5ZdmS-EAbHo Europe’s Lost Decades in Semiconductors https://youtu.be/PpSdytrNEBg https://youtu.be/PpSdytrNEBg It's great to get chip manufacturing back to Germany after all the struggles, even if it's not cutting edge.
- tmoneyplease 3y agoGlad to see many fans of Asianometry.
- hospitalJail 3y agoI watched a few of their videos, but I felt like it was an anti-china propaganda outlet. I'm def not a fan of the CCP, so I loved watching the videos, but I felt like I was getting brainwashed. Does anyone know how valid/factual their videos are?
- flohofwoe 3y agoThe video about the East German chip industry is well researched. Making the chip industry investments responsible alone for the collapse of the GDR is a bit click-baity (it was at most one contributing factor).
- nntwozz 3y agoAs factual and valid as you could hope for. I find his work very thorough. Here's a video about China's Gallium & Germanium Export Controls: https://youtu.be/J4XU-QxXJMw https://youtu.be/J4XU-QxXJMw I didn't find it anti-China, neither are his other videos in my opinion. According to the transcript below Jon Y. is half Taiwanese/Hong Kong, make of that what you will. https://www.manifold1.com/episodes/jon-y-asianometry-on-semiconductor-tech-and-u-s-china-competition/transcript https://www.manifold1.com/episodes/jon-y-asianometry-on-semi...
- richbell 3y agoCan you provide some examples of content you felt was anti-China propaganda / brainwashing?
- alecco 3y agoThis smells of government-subsidized terrible ideas. German energy costs, land costs, lack of water, crazy high taxes, and anti-business governments. OTOH Netherlands would make a much better option in almost every angle. And add having ASML engineers around the corner.
- rottencupcakes 3y agoAs a dumb American, can you help explain how energy costs, land costs, and water supply can be that significantly different across an open border?
- surgical_fire 3y agoEach country has their own energy and water providers, land taxes, etc. There are a bunch of regulations on how companies can operate in the economic block, but it's still a bunch of sovereign countries there.
- KingOfCoders 3y agoI would assume land costs are higher in NL, as there is less (I don't think Tesla paid a lot for the land) water in Germany depends on the region (but even Tesla in a dry region seems to do fine, although there are protests), there is more water in the south and less in the north, but again more near the coast (where I live), Netherlands has 26% corporate tax, Germany has 23% to 32% corporate tax, depending where you are (federalist state, some portion is determined by municipalities). Energy prices are currently high b/c a lot is produced by gas powered plants, but as Germany peaked renewables at 82% lately, and new renewables are very cheap (there are solar plants popping up everywhere here), energy should not be a problem (chip production is not aluminium or fertilizer production). The main reason TSMC builds there is that there are already lots of chip makers and knowledgeable staff to hire (and state subsidies, which if correctly used can be a good thing, Bavaria made the transition from an agricultural country to a high tech country with state subsidies, money transfers from the richer states in Germany to Bavaria - of course if used badly are just lost without effect).
- jsnell 3y ago
- NKosmatos 3y ago“…begin construction of the fab in the second half of 2024 with production targeted to begin by the end of 2027”. It’s good to see new fabs in Europe, but I think it’s a bit late and with “old” technology. On the other hand there are many other areas in need of chips that will benefit from this in the coming years.
- KingOfCoders 3y agoModern is better, but many industries are fine with "old" technology. As the pandemic showed, the problem (for industry and mass market consumer electronics) was not Intel/AMD/Nvidia high end chips but chips for washing maschines (had to wait 7 (!) months for a dishwasher b/c Miele had no chips) and cars.
- bluGill 3y agoIs modern really better? If you are waiting on a compile, or running the latest game or - other performance critical task of course it is. However for embedded systems older processes are likely to result in chips that operate longer under harsh conditions and so may be better. It depends on the application. I know where I work we have customers that run our products at -70C and +50C, we can't run a lot of modern chips because they fail our tests at those operating temperatures.
- oplaadpunt 3y agoIt isn't necessarily, especially if your chip involves some analog or RF design, or must be robust. It is only for increased compute power where the smalles nodes shine
- oplaadpunt 3y agoSmaller nodes also do not inherently have better performance for all tasks. They bring performance penalties in some regards, extra costs, and more complexity, which might make something older like 65mm a far better choice
- KingOfCoders 3y agoWhat irony if chips bring wealth to saxony, when chip production in the GDR was one of the reason it collapsed.
- murkt 3y agoI’m not familiar with the story, can you elaborate a bit on the chip production being a reason of GDR collapse?
- KingOfCoders 3y agoThe collapse of the GDR has many reasons, mostly it ran out of money during the 80s. There have been several reasons for running out of money, e.G. taking on massive credit in the 70s to produce more consumer goods and build flats (the reason Honecker was very popular after his coup against Ulbricht), which it had problems to pay back in the 80s. Also minor things like spending millions on importing coffee (all experiments to replace coffee with something else failed - Vietnam is one of the worlds biggest coffee exporters because of GDR investments that came too late). Another reason was Russia cutting cheap oil during the 70s after the oil shock. The GDR had imported cheap oil from Russia, was refining it and selling it with high margins to the West for $/Deutsche Mark. That source of money dried up in the 80s. With sparse resources, the GDR was between a rock and a hard place. For modern production it needed chips, reverse engineering western chips e.G. Z80s (reverse engineered chip called U880 in the GDR) or smuggling chips was very expensive (~5-10x the price). Building chips on their own was also expensive. But they decided to invest billions into home grown chip production (they smuggled a whole factory via Austria, see "Red Fini") leading to the famous 1mbit chip "U61000" - which was old at that time, also the Japanese produced the same amount of chips in a day that the GDR was able to produce in a year. So things went nowhere. But those billions were not available for other things. Without money ($, Deutsche Mark), in the 80s to pay back credits to western banks a lot of vegetables, fruits and consumer products like clothing and washing maschines were exported to the West (most of the fruit production of the GDR around West Berlin went to West Berlin, many products in the West German QUELLE catalogue - like Sears - were made in the GDR). These products were missing in local shops, shelves were often empty, especially outside the large cities like Berlin, Leipzig and Dresden. Additionally factories in the 80s in the GDR were in a very bad state (my father in law was head of production in a large machine factory in East Berlin during that time), lots of stuff was being stolen on a constant basis, maschines were old and lacked computer support (see above). This again reduced available consumer goods. Because consumer goods were scarce, when things were available people bought more than they needed, leading to more scarcity (as seen during the pandemic). It is said that every household in the GDR had a second car as spare parts (another example are agricultural factories hoarding harvester spare parts, so when broke down, spare parts where hard to get). Missing consumer goods in the GDR led people to leave their jobs in factories whenever something was available, e.G. rain boots, which reduced productivity even more. In the end so many things were missing that people mass fled the GDR when Hungary opened the border. All this together made the Central Committee believe everything is lost (book to read in German "Das Ende der SED - Die letzten Tage des Zentralkomitees" with meeting notes from the Central Committee), and the Russians not willing to come to help with tanks this time [0] (like they did in 1953 to kill Germans to keep the communists in power in East Germany) power was transfered to the people leading to reunification. [0] For comparison: When Poland went bancrupt in 1980/1981 Russia and the GDR were near an invasion - which Poland prevented with a military coup.
- DeathArrow 3y ago28nm is 'advanced semiconductor manufacturing'? Did they use ChatGPT for the press release, or what?
- runeks 3y agoJust because it isn’t bleeding edge doesn’t mean it isn’t advanced.
- KingOfCoders 3y agoSilicon valley started by billions and billions of state money pumped into companies before, during and after WW2 (e.G IBM opened in San Jose in '43).
- js8 3y agoExactly. All the big economic success was due to state coordination and intervention, not (neo-)liberalism. Liberalism might work for a smaller country that becomes a trading hub (like Singapore), and uses low taxes as a sort of parasitic strategy; that's why it cannot be replicated by large countries. I am glad that Germany is coming to their senses and finally rejecting neoliberalism. Now if only Eurozone leadership (which was created during neoliberal heydays) would do the same across the EU.
- dontlaugh 3y agoSingapore’s economy is also significantly planned, despite the opposite being the common knowledge. Same with South Korea.
- KingOfCoders 3y agoAlso Singapore has 17% corporate tax, compared with 12.5% in Ireland.
- dtf 3y agoI was kind of shocked to find this out too. For instance: "As of 2020, 78.7% of Singapore residents live in public housing, down from a high of 88.0% in 2000." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_housing_in_Singapore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_housing_in_Singapore
- js8 3y agoYeah, that only strengthens my argument that neoliberalism has failed.
- r0b1n 3y agoEurozone leadership will never do that, because of national egoisms. Just look at how Airbus builds its airplanes, because everybody wants a slice, so they fly each airplane body halfway across the continent and back... And Airbus is just 4 nations (FR, DE, ES, UK). Collaboration across all of the Eurozone or all of the EU would be a mess of ITER-like proportions.
- zhengiszen 3y ago[flagged]
- qlkjwenf 3y agoHUGE mistake for TSMC! Don't forget that german authorities hate entrepreneurs and they will do whatever possible to make their life as excruciating as possible. Communism ideology founders (Marx, Engels etc.) were all born in Germany and this is not a coincidence.
- qwytw 3y agoConsidering majority of the funding comes from the government it doesen't seem like a bad deal...
- dontupvoteme 3y agoAlong with (hopefully) that french startup (Mistral) founded by the LLaMA guys, the EU is putting together the pieces they need to keep up with AI and maintain their ability to leverage their control mechanisms upon the FAANGS. Realpolitk wise they absolutely cannot risk regulatory capture to a few select firms on the west coast of the USA. Altman himself threatened (for a brief period) to cut off GPT to the EU after Italy rightfully brought up issues with data privacy. Microsoft made him walk that one back real quick - he probably wasn't really aware that he is now one of their employees - but it hopefully got through to Brussels about how these guys want to operate. We'll also probably get a lot better support for languges which aren't english (especially French, I really love their stubborn nature to stick with their langauge over the anglo one), an entire other scary effect of LLMs is the potential to accelerate language death Very nice to see.
- Nux 3y agoI think AI is an afterthought here, if at all. Automotive is the main target and to a degree IoT. They couldn't build cars during the pandemic due to broken supply chains, that's when their lightbulb went on afaik.
- berkes 3y agoBut isn't a lot of modern automotive all about ai? Stuff like image recognition on camera's and sensors, error prediction, data-aggregation and, in future, self-driving?
- qwytw 3y agoYou're not going to run that AI on chips made in fab which will be already outdated by 15+ years when it's opened.
- arlcode 3y agoNot really. Most tasks in a car do not run on high speed cutting edge chips. A few random examples: - adjusting your side mirrors - the control of the AC cooling unit and speed of the fans - electronically adjustable seats - parking sensors (the beeping kind) - wiper controls - engine controls (ice or BV) - inverter (BV) All of those require electronics most require a microcontroller but not the latest 3nm Snapdragon.
- steeve 3y agoI wonder why they chose the country with the second worst electricity CO2 wise? Unless it’s for cars?
- ComputerGuru 3y agoProbably because they didn’t care enough compared to other factors?
- ramesh31 3y ago> I wonder why they chose the country with the second worst electricity CO2 wise? Chip fab locations are about water and talent. Electricity sources are pretty fungible. The former not so much.
- zsz 3y agoThis is quite a surprise. Germany is currently reeling from poor economic conditions including high inflation rates, skyrocketing energy costs, a measure of pessimistic disillusionment vis-a-vis their elected leadership, etc. This is also related to a general sense that businesses are exiting the German market due to burdensome regulations and rising cost of doing business (in large part due to spiraling energy costs). I am no expert, but this announcement stands in stark contrast to said premises--and I can't help but wonder if this move might not be at least in part politically motivated. The facts as they currently stand: Germany considers itself a trading partner with China, but is aware of the rising imbalance in competitiveness (significantly due to phasing out of ICE vehicle manufacturing, where they held a significant lead, and simultaneous phasing in of BEV manufacturing, where China holds significant advantages, both in accrued institutional knowledge and access to requisite raw materials). At the same time, the German leadership coalition has been frustrated by the rising pushback against the Green transformation of the German economy, which they view as non negotiable, but is objectively a non-trivial factor of the economic malaise. Let's say TSMC does manage to build a fab before 2027 (the year China is expected to complete the modernization of their military and launch their campaign against the island of Formosa's governing body, aka the Taiwanese government). How might such an extravagant outlay of investment funds (which could significantly improve the economic outlook in Germany and take a lot of pressure off the existing government) impact Germany's relationship with China in the crucial near term (the next few years)? Let's not forget, for decades the CCP worked strategically on bringing about the reverse: isolating the ROC government by engaging in lending practices that sometimes resulted in situations where they could use this leverage to promote a gradual deprivation of the ROC's status as an officially recognized governing body (which has shrunk over the years to a mere 11 or even fewer nations). Of course it isn't as if Germany's support would significantly affect the CCP's (meaning, Xi Jinping's) plans of Chinese Rejuvenation (wherein bringing Taiwan under heel is a non negotiable component), considering that even the US' increasingly overt support has had no effect on what the CCP has always viewed as an inevitability. Conversely, as the Ukraine debacle has indisputably demonstrated, even indirect support (especially from a Western ally) has a profoundly disruptive effect on the expected development and eventual outcome of any military engagement. Also, as some may still remember, one of the principal factors that led to China's significant manufacturing modernization was a somewhat similar deal, wherein China "bailed out" a prominent US manufacturer (Boeing?) that was close to bankruptcy, by agreeing to purchase several billion dollars' worth of civilian airplanes, and in return being handed the high precision tooling infrastructure that's indispensable in the manufacture of high tech machinery (because of the military/national security implications, this required political support at the highest levels of government, meaning presidential and bipartisan support). I am suggesting this could be analogous, differing chiefly in the type of benefit that is gained by the other party, as a result. For China, it was high precision tools, while for the 23 million inhabitants of the island of Formosa (who as a group, if not a sovereign nation already dominate the semiconductor industry) it may well be a tactically swift reversal in international standing (something that barely registered at all until very recently, but then rapidly expanded into an all encompassing existential crisis rivaling their defeat at the hands of the Chinese communists, 70 years prior).
- dav_Oz 3y agoFor those unfamiliar with the region (Saxony, Dresden): A registered association (e.V. in German) bluntly named "Silicon Saxony e.V." (est. in 2000) with over 450 members headquartered in Dresden pretty much sums up the infrastructure and ambition.[0][1] As pointed out the process TSMC’s 28/22 nanometer planar CMOS and 16/12 nanometer FinFET process technology (fabrication will begin in 2027) is not "cutting edge" but set to satisfy the (local) demand [2] mostly for the automotive industry. I guess a good conservative foothold given the current economic/geopolitical environment, but it's not like an innovation/investing boom or something. However from a perspective of a young student, Saxony/Dresden - as for now - is pretty inexpensive as compared to Berlin, Hamburg or Munich and has ample opportunities (TU Dresden, Fraunhofer, MPI, Helmholtz Zentrum ...). [From personal experience I find the people in Saxony (Leipzig, Dresden) have a more deep-rooted skepticism towards the federal government (or any centralized entity ruling over them) which can lead to a good thing - interesting perspectives/lively discussions or depending on your position less good - leaning more to the political (far) right.] [0]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_Saxony https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_Saxony [1]https://silicon-saxony.de/ https://silicon-saxony.de/ [2]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020%E2%80%932023_global_chip_shortage https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020%E2%80%932023_global_chi...
- seeekr 3y agominor nitpick: "e.V." in Germany is "eingetragener Verein", "registered association" and is a form of association that's extremely common and use for all kinds of things, e.g. local sports groups, interest groups, etc, so "e.V." in and of itself doesn't have anything to do with industry, though as in the above case it can be used that way!
- _Microft 3y agoThe Max-Planck-Society [0][1] is also an e.V. and they have a yearly budget in the order of 2.5B€ or so. e.V.s can be very diverse in their nature. [0] (de) https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max-Planck-Gesellschaft https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max-Planck-Gesellschaft [1] (en) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Planck_Society https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Planck_Society
- rllearneratwork 3y agoWhy there? Germany has some crazy labor laws, they will be in for a surprise long term.
- mrweasel 3y agoThey aren't that crazy, where else would you build them... France, Italy? German labor laws are pretty average for western Europe. You need stability, skilled and productive workers and it wouldn't hurt to have a chemical industry, Germany has all that.
- rllearneratwork 3y agoUSA (and yes, I know they are building some here already). Maybe UK as well.
- mrweasel 3y agoNeither of these are in the EU and won't solve the problem for the EU, they'd still be dependent on other countries. The point is to bring the production to the EU.
- sergiotapia 3y agoIf enough of these pop up Taiwan is cooked right? Is there anything Taiwan is doing to try to stop these efforts? Also in terms of the world security which is preferable: 1. Have many fabs and derisk by diversification? 2. Keep Taiwan safe and chest-bump china?
- sharts 3y agoWhy does it always seem major projects like this start about 10 years after people realize we need major projects like this?
- ryukoposting 3y agoI think folks here are missing the point of a fab like this. 16nm FinFET is space age technology by embedded systems standards. Nobody's expecting CPUs as advanced as Sandy Bridge to come out of this fab, let alone some bazillion-core 8GHz monster. The smallest transistor used in an STM32xx chip today is 40nm, and AFAIK that's reserved for the really fancy DSP chips.
- kevin_thibedeau 3y agoActual space age tech relies on outdated, large feature process nodes for the improved radiation hardening they offer. Terrestrial embedded is light years beyond what goes into space with any expectation of long term reliability.
- ryukoposting 3y ago"space age" in the colloquial sense.
- Tade0 3y agoYeah. Up until recently my friend was employed in designing chips in this process. But it's not like they're designing them exactly the same way as years ago - some advancements are not strictly related to feature size and IIRC these new-old chips are considerably more power-efficient.
- ryukoposting 3y agoCertainly true, a 40nm transistor made in 2013 is not the same as one made in 2023. Likewise, a 16nm transistor made in 2017 will not be the same as one in 2027. The power efficiency on the newer wireless SoCs is unreal.
- addaon 3y agoBesides older processes being "good enough" for embedded, many smaller micros depend on having a process that can handle embedded NOR flash. I'm not aware of any non-planar logic process that supports flash yet.
- hbarka 3y agoGenuinely curious how these events fall in place. I'd like to know how long a selection process like this takes, were there other cities in the running, and how did Dresden become the choice. Is the best similarity with how car companies like VW and Honda choose cities in the US?
- fsw 3y agoDresden is kind of a semiconductor hotspot in Germany. AMD and Infineon have factories there for example which also attracted suppliers and related technology to the area.
- dragonelite 3y agoLike with the Arizona fab question where will they find the skilled workers? Putting up four walls and a roof, with some chip fabbing equipment doesn't make an efficient fabrication location. When you have American TSMC worker complain about long shift hours i imaging it wouldn't be any better in Europe for TSMC. This feels more like TSMC grabbing from subsidies pots where it can hoping this will please the NATO nations and that TSMC hopefully survive long enough te reenter the mainland again on time before the mainland goes completely domestic with chips fabrication.
- flohofwoe 3y agoDresden is already a major microelectronics hub in Europe (and has been for over 50 years), and Germany traditionally has a good vocational training system. Of course - as everywhere - the German industry always cries about not finding enough skilled workers, but what they actually mean is they don't find enough skilled workers at the wages they want to pay, but "the market will take care of that" ;)
- dukeyukey 3y agoThe population of _all_ of Arizona is only 7.2 million. Just within 100km of Dresden you've got 5 million. Add in a much easier, faster immigration policy (esepcially from the rest of Europe) and a higher (although still not high) unemployment rate and they're probably gonna have an easier time of it than Arizone does.
- cdash 3y agoNot sure how the state population is relevant, the vast majority of people living in Arizona live in the Phoenix metropolitan area which is where these new fabs are being built. The population size for that area is also around 5 million. Also, how is immigration between countries in Europe easier than immigration between states in the US. That is simply not possible when the US has no language/cultural barriers.
- knallfrosch 3y agoDresden is already home to Globalfoundries, Bosch and Infineon.
- puchatek 3y agoSo "fab" is short for microchip factory? TIL
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- dagw 3y agoThe "fab" in "semiconductor fab" is short for "fabrication plant".
- qiqitori 3y agoWhy are there so many somewhat toxic comments on this article?
- timeon 3y agoIt is about Fab that is not in native Anglosphere. Some bias is expected on Anglosphere site even if the news is not about something ground-breaking.
- flohofwoe 3y agoIt's also all coming together: it's about Germany, which a lot of Europeans don't have a positive opinion on (to put it mildly), then it's about East Germany which a lot of West Germans don't have a positive opinion on (to put it mildly), and finally it's also about the EU's / Germany's governing model which most startup-scene-hipsters on HN don't have a positive opinion on (to put it mildly). There's hardly a topic like this where almost everybody finds something to complain about ;)
- zambal 3y ago> Germany, which a lot of Europeans don't have a positive opinion on (to put it mildly) Do you have a source for that, because that's not the impression I, as a non German European, have.
- flohofwoe 3y agoI also had to Google to confirm my subjective perception, and it's actually not all that bad, typical case of "not great, not terrible": https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/10/14/the-european-union/ https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/10/14/the-european-u... (PS: search for "Views of Germany positive except in Greece")
- P_I_Staker 3y agoIt varies. They have a bit of a rep and stereotypes, much like France, for example. The thing is that germany has the history of racial genocide, along with a number of nasty features. The german economy has done well. Maybe too well. They refuse to buy non-german products to spread the prosperity with EU. Germany as a country has some cultural feature that are not fun. It's riddled with busy-bodies. Germans have too many of the type of people that can be a pain to work with due to their relentless pursuit of... constant improvement? perfection? idk what it is. Then you have the countries stance towards outsiders, the disabled, people that are different that isn't always the most welcoming. Germans can be sooo snooty and pretentious. Example from trip to Berlin. I did not realize how hard the clubs were to get into. You have to do this whole song and dance where you prepare to look cool, somewhat edgy, but not too edgy! while simultaneous pretending not to care about any of it. Everything must be just right! Don't come alone (no one wants weird loner), or in a large group (big groups can be too much). Don't be foreign (this is an unwritten rule they pretend doesn't exist). You pay for tickets too, even if they don't let you in. All this for a techno club, which is unheard of, even blasphemous where I'm from. Also the genocide / Nazi thing. I'm really sick of people acting like germany should just be over it by now. It's the same people living there that did it basically. Some of those same ideas exists (see before mentioned policies that exclude foreigners and people with disabilities) So yeah, I get the hate. Definitely, the French tend to feel this way, but it seems like the Italians get it too... and UK and Spain, lol. It's really hit or miss, and often just a mild dislike.
- zoobab 3y agoAs I predicted, public money of the European Chips Act will flow to the big guys: https://pr.tsmc.com/english/news/3049 https://pr.tsmc.com/english/news/3049 "with the final investment decision pending confirmation of the level of public funding for this project. The project is planned under the framework of the European Chips Act."
- Aeolun 3y agoThe small players have no clue how to get even a little bit of this.
- generic92034 3y agoWhat would you consider to be small players when it comes to chip production? I mean, the factories cost billions. So where would small companies play a role except as contractor, supplier, etc. for the big ones?
- addaon 3y agoThe small players are the equivalents of VIS (Vanguard International Semiconductor) and similar. A few million 8" wafers per year, but targeting specialty processes (GaN, MEMs, etc). Cutting-edge 12" fabs are capital-intensive, but there's a huge and growing role for older processes and specialty processes.
- PeterisP 3y agoIt's not like there exists any small player who can even imagine building a fab like that. All the small players in semiconductors exist by doing some particular niche like design or making some tool, but all of them outsource the actual fabrication - the thing that European Chips Act wants to fund - to someone else.
- szundi 3y agoAre these 2000 jobs really high-tech?