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Current analysis projects US semi to face shortage of ~80k talent in next few years, ~300k+ in by decades end. This is reality pretty much in every semi produce

Current analysis projects US semi to face shortage of ~80k talent in next few years, ~300k+ in by decades end. This is reality pretty much in every semi producer countries, SKR and TW both have 50k-100k+ shortage with pretty developed talent pipeline. From everything I've read, current US+co short/medium term talent production won't be enough fill all the new fabs being proposed. Unviable due to operating costs which can always be subsidized, unviable due to lack of talent is much harder to address. Apart from training more, only way to plug gap is to poach talent from CHIP4 partners, which US has the money for. But I surmise it will get geopolitically ugly. For reference PRC after elevating semi to first-level dicipline in 2018 is pumping out about 30k IC graduates per year. They're still about 200k short, ~520k/720k out of what IC talent 2018 white paper estimated PRC needed for complete semi industry. This is PRC that graduates ~5M STEM with huge population to draw from that bias towards S&T in tertiary. Which leads to the other uncomfortable point that a complete semi industry is more than just fabs, there's a lot of critical semi supply chain stuck in TW / East Asia (SKR/JP) that's going to get disrupted anyway in event of conflict. I don't see any indication US is resolving to reshore the entire semi chain.

nickpsecurity 3y ago
This could be an opportunity for low-cost, educational groups to scale or partner up. Is there a list of degree or course requirements fabs are looking for? What programs would be necessary to meet that demand?
bsder 3y ago
> Unviable due to operating costs which can always be subsidized, unviable due to lack of talent is much harder to address. Or, gee, let's throw this out there: perhaps if the pay wasn't shit, people would go into the field. You know, just like computer science over the past couple of decades.

nickpsecurity 3y ago

This could be an opportunity for low-cost, educational groups to scale or partner up. Is there a list of degree or course requirements fabs are looking for? What programs would be necessary to meet that demand?

bsder 3y ago

> Unviable due to operating costs which can always be subsidized, unviable due to lack of talent is much harder to address. Or, gee, let's throw this out there: perhaps if the pay wasn't shit, people would go into the field. You know, just like computer science over the past couple of decades.