> Fabs got too expensive; that was why... I would phrase that as "fabs got so complex that zero-ish companies had leadership competent enough to manage both co

> Fabs got too expensive; that was why... I would phrase that as "fabs got so complex that zero-ish companies had leadership competent enough to manage both competitive fabs, and the rest of the finance / design / marketing / sales / support stack. Even back in the mid-80's, when fabs were (relatively) dead simple and dirt cheap, Motorola was famously bungling at fabbing their own 68000-series chips.