10 ms·
> This is bad news for Mediatek and Qualcomm. And good news for everyone else.
by pelagicAustral 1mo ago
> This is bad news for Mediatek and Qualcomm.
And good news for everyone else.
- yoz-y 1mo agoYes and no. Having more competition in the space is excellent news. However I am sad that the world interdependence is eroding as most other countries seem to sit on their hands and happily outsource every bit of manufacturing to a single country.
- cromka 1mo agoExcept this trend is actually reversing now, with fabs being built outside of Taiwan?
- cubefox 1mo agoIt's not reversing, it's continuing the trend of more and more manufacturing moving to Chinese companies. It already happened to TVs and it's currently happening with RAM.
- etse 1mo agoBy Chinese company, do you mean Taiwan is Chinese in the same way China is Chinese?
- mschuster91 1mo agoNo. The problem is that TSMCs new capacity is already hogged by AI peddlers for years to come (in fact, AI BS is the reason why these new non-Taiwanese fabs got the massive US and EU subsidies), and so everyone else not flush with cash from the AI hypetrain has no alternative than to go to China - and deliver all their secrets to the CCP. And eventually, just like the Western solar, battery, pharma and car companies all have learned, the CCP will use that knowledge to surpass and undercut everyone else.
- Dah00n 1mo agoDo they also deliver all their secrets to US/EU/Taiwan/etc or is it only with China that it goes from ordering some products manufactured to "deliver all their secrets"? Strange how almost everyone points their fingers at the CCP when we know for a fact (hey Snowden etc) that the US does what we say we think China does. I guess China bad > facts.
- dopa42365 1mo agoGoddamn turbocapitalist commies! How dare they!
- deleted 1mo ago[deleted]
- cubefox 1mo agoXiaomi may manufacture their chips in Taiwan (by tsmc) but Xiaomi is still a Chinese hardware company, similar to how Apple or Qualcomm are US American hardware companies.
- TSiege 1mo agoI think describing what's happening "other countries seem to sit on their hands and happily outsource every bit of manufacturing to a single country" is disingenuous. It's been dubbed China Shock 2.0 and it's being taken very seriously by the EU. The US admin is a joke and too busy shooting itself in both feet to have coherent policy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_Shock_2.0 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_Shock_2.0
- 1234letshaveatw 1mo agoyet somehow the outcome for the US has been much better. EU wins on paper though, yay!
- oblio 1mo ago> outcome for the US has been much better Is this better outcome for the US in the room with us?
- nxm 1mo agoCompare any measurable economic and investment stat in EU vs US
- makingstuffs 1mo agoWhat happens when you compare quality of life? Or workers rights? Pretty sure that your average person cares more about those two data points…
- saturn8601 1mo agoThat might be a mirage temporarily made reality by outsourcing defense to the US, manufacturing to China and the work required for GDP growth to refugees. All three will be going away sooner or later.
- 1mo ago
- plutomeetsyou 1mo agoCountries and institutions should always produce things where they are excellent at producing, in forms of specialization and compete in terms of comparative advantages.
- dymk 1mo agoThat depends on if everybody gets along and is willing to trade
- adwn 1mo agoThis attitude, if followed without qualifications, is dangerously naive and shortsighted, as the last few years of geopolitical events have shown.
- PowerElectronix 1mo agoYes, and no. Yes because you are vulnerable to supply chain disruption by illwilled countries. But illwilled countries that disrupt supply chains greatly incentivise others to diversify supply away from them. China could have the monopoly of rare earth production and refinery for all of eternity. But because of their reaction towards all the us allies when the us increased tariffs, I don't expect them to be relevant enough to disrupt markets with rare earths sanctions in 10-20 years.
- kstenerud 1mo ago> But illwilled countries that disrupt supply chains greatly incentivise others to diversify supply away from them. ... Except when they can't in any meaningful span of time.
- kridsdale1 1mo agoThis is true until you add a layer of geopolitics to your analysis.
- melasadra 1mo agoWe surely cant be this naive after the recent history of: - China weaponizing the world's dependence on rare earth - The US weaponizing the world's dependence on SWIFT - Russia weaponizing Europe's dependence on natural gas - Iran weaponizing the the world's dependence of oil supply through strait of Hormuz
- deadlast2 1mo agoI don't think it's by choice just ask all those extinct manufacturers
- saturn8601 1mo agoMaybe new companies can spring up and be competitive with AI assisted design. Im assuming the cost was too high for those old companies to survive right? Small nimble companies could theoretically compete in some segments vs large bloated slobs (even if they have AI as well). This is all just hypothetical thought.
- RobotToaster 1mo agoIt was a choice, western oligarchs handed China the means of production on a silver platter in the pursuit of short term profits.
- wolvoleo 1mo agoAnd even that wasn't anything new. They did the same with Japan and then Taiwan. Remember when made in Japan was a joke, then made in Taiwan? Now Japan is known for quality electronics and options and Taiwan for state of the art semiconductors.
- Grombobulous 1mo agoI think Western people still call this situation “outsourcing” when in reality what is happening is that China is better at manufacturing than everyone else, and they’re starting to be better than everyone else at design and engineering, too. When we buy software from Silicon Valley or a nice Mercedes Benz from Germany we don’t use this same language “outsourcing.” Colloquially, outsourcing implies low quality or cheap price. No, what’s happening here is that China makes the best products in numerous categories and we are choosing to import them, because the best products are the most desirable.
- throwaway63467 1mo agoWell at this point they are probably the only country in the world that can produce a car end to end starting from the raw iron ore and other elements up to the chips and software that runs on them (I’m sure they will still need to import some small stuff probably like Rhodium or Iridium maybe), who is going to compete with that? Everything done in country, no tariffs at all throughout the entire production cycle. That said some of these industry especially metallurgical ones will never return to Europe or US as they basically destroy and pollute the environment on a large scale, in China that still seems acceptable but also might change promoting them to outsource to other countries which they already do in some areas I think.
- coliveira 1mo ago> China that still seems acceptable China has made a tremendous effort to move to a clean(er) industrial system, using a lot of renewables and clean energy and improving environmental standards. At this point production in China is probably the best for the environment compared to most countries, including the US that is deeply invested in oil production.
- Danox 1mo agoChina evidently is pushing to move to sodium ion batteries. They didn’t have to. They could’ve stuck with lithium. I’ll let you guess what what would’ve happened in the United States they would’ve said we don’t have to this lithium already works. Why do you want to upset the Apple Cart. They are also moving close to a point where they will bring Thorium Reactors on line they don’t have to. They could just stick with uranium, but they’re not. Is this part of the fact that they have engineers running a lot of of the things at the top of their government instead of lawyers? They seem to be building a lot of infrastructure they are in the process of building several dams on the Brahmaputra River. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medog_Hydropower_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medog_Hydropower_Station
- Brybry 1mo agoXiaomi's Xring O3 is manufactured by TSMC N3P process in Taiwan. [1] MediaTek Dimensity 9500 is also manufactured by TSMC N3P process in Taiwan. [2] There was no world interdependence change (unless one considers China and Taiwan to be the same countries). [1] https://www.notebookcheck.net/Xiaomi-launches-XRing-O3-claims-it-is-the-fastest-smartphone-SoC-with-an-AnTuTu-score-of-over-5-million.1376668.0.html#:~:text=TSMC%27s%20N3P%20process https://www.notebookcheck.net/Xiaomi-launches-XRing-O3-claim... [2] https://www.notebookcheck.net/MediaTek-Dimensity-9500-Processor-Benchmarks-and-Specs.957550.0.html#:~:text=probably%20N3P https://www.notebookcheck.net/MediaTek-Dimensity-9500-Proces...
- szatkus 1mo agoMediaTek is a Taiwanese company. Xiaomi could put any backdoor that the government tell them to install and TSMC won't be able to catch that.
- Dah00n 1mo agoDo you say the same about Intel, Amd, etc. or is it only big bad China?
- InTheArena 1mo agoThere's been 40 years of documented push back when western governments try to backdoor things - starting with clipper. Pushback is not always successful - but it's far more transparent then China.
- linkregister 1mo agoAre there any documented cases of backdoors being present in Chinese hardware at time of manufacturing?
- bryant 1mo agoTwo just this year, CVE-2026-66747 and CVE-2026-11405.
- csomar 1mo agoSo same as before?
- markdown 1mo agoThis is what was sold to – and often forced on – countries by the US and their allies via the IMF and World Bank. Global free trade meant that you only produced what you had an advantage in and bought what others could produce at lower cost.
- sophrosyne42 1mo agoThis would be interdependence expanding. Manufacturing isn't the only kind of economic activity
- locknitpicker 1mo ago> However I am sad that the world interdependence is eroding (...) That's quite the odd statement. I don't think that it's in anyone's best interests to have a single country control access to chips. It might be in the US's interests to keep everyone out if the field, but the US is a single country among 195 countries. And isn't the US's dominant ideology all about competition?
- mschuster91 1mo agoNo. Chinese dumpers undercutting everyone else and destroying the competition is never good.
- Dah00n 1mo agoWas it bad when it was the US doing it against the UK? Or is it only when the people doing it eat more rice than us that it is bad? People said the same thing about the Japanese (they steal designs, they copy, it is bad quality, they are stealing our jobs, and so on).
- chasd00 1mo ago> Was it bad when it was the US doing it against the UK? Or is it only when the people doing it eat more rice than us that it is bad? dumping is always bad.
- Levitz 1mo ago>Or is it only when the people doing it eat more rice than us that it is bad? It's definitely different when the player doesn't even have to play by the market. Comparing US companies and Chinese companies is not apples to apples.
- AngryData 1mo agoI will agree that dumping is probably just bad overall. But the US, and much of the rest of the world, allows it to happen both within and outside of their countries, sometimes even financially supporting it with government programs. So I really don't see why I should care that someone in China is doing it. We can't hold others to standards significantly higher than we hold for ourselves.
- catigula 1mo agoLol, no. This is so stupid. China itself uses the "dominate and corral" model for their industries, and had severe tariffs to grow their various industrial bases, such as automotive.
- xanthor 1mo agoSame is true of US, Germany, Britain, etc
- germandiago 1mo agoFrom the outside, it is still competition. If they go too far to impose their system, we stop buying :)
- catigula 1mo agoExcept they've now ground your native industry under their boot and have total monopoly control because you've given up your critical infrastructure. You can no longer stop buying. That isn't an option. This is geopolitics 101; your fantasy version is decades out of date.
- germandiago 1mo agoTo some extent collusion and geopolitics are a fact, indeed. I do not dispute that.
- speed_spread 1mo agoIf the Linux drivers aren't up upstreamed and the chips aren't sold to anyone else, meh.