> SMIC has been able to poach talent by throwing mountains of money at them. This might not be possible going forward. Not being able to work on EUV could be ca

> SMIC has been able to poach talent by throwing mountains of money at them. This might not be possible going forward. Not being able to work on EUV could be career suicide, and I’m not so sure China can be so frivolous with their money anymore. They have to start raising taxes to compensate for the loss of land lease revenue. I would be extremely surprised if China wasn't throwing mountains of money at building their own EUV lithography machine so they could totally cut out ASML. I would also be extremely surprised if such a project wasn't top priority for them, and would be one of the last things to be cut "to compensate for the loss of land lease revenue." I mean, this is what it took ASML to get there (https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/04/01/1090393/how-asml-took-over-the-chipmaking-chessboard/ https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/04/01/1090393/how-asml...): > Yet in 2017, after an investment of $6.5 billion in R&D over 17 years, ASML’s bet began to pay off. Assuming China's starting from square one, takes the same amount of time and money to develop EUV, and the government pays 100% of the cost, it looks like the yearly cost (382 million) would amount to about 2/3 of their current green energy subsidies ($607 million in 2022 https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/china-sets-2022-renewable-power-subsidy-607-mln-2021-11-16/ https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/china-sets-2022-rene...)