Advanced chipmakers will get new subsidies to design and mfg in the states?

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proveitwithdata

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Federal gov will announce the awarded subsidized chip mfg.

Are we finally getting more on shore arm based, x86 chip designed and made in the usa?
How long will plans announced today take to materialize?

www.cnbc.com

U.S. to reportedly announce billions of dollars in subsidies for advanced chips

The Biden administration is expected to award billions of dollars in subsidies to top semiconductor companies in the coming weeks to help build new factories.
www.cnbc.com www.cnbc.com
 
JeffKeryk said:
So so important to re-onshore chip tech. The tougher problem is sourcing qualified engineers and programmers to man the factories.
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are there rules to the funding and how it can used for hiring purposes? I know tsmc had an issue finding onshore talent, dont know what happened to that?
 
JeffKeryk said:
The problem is education. We don't value it.
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True, but with i assume these factories looking at a bare minimum of a half a decade out to operation, lots of future talent in the making with the right instruction and programs (logistics, and financial cost of said instruction)
 
It's about time but we seriously lack qualified talent for this. All the silicon workers I know of are ready to retire, if not already retired, and nobody there to learn or take their place.
 
Pew said:
It's about time but we seriously lack qualified talent for this. All the silicon workers I know of are ready to retire, if not already retired, and nobody there to learn or take their place.
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Yeah, well, it's no different in other industries, like aerospace. Being GenX, I've quickly become one of the senior type in the organization - most of the baby boomers took voluntary retirement packages during/right-after Covid. The 20-something replacements last about two years, and then move-on for a variety of reasons, especially when some of the work, while important, doesn't achieve the (pre-conceived) level of excitement to keep them engaged on a day-to-day basis.
 
Making wafers is one thing. Where are they going to be tested? packaged? tested again? Then actually used, you know, soldered down to a PCB (that likewise made in the USA) (and soldered in the US too).

Need a big investment to get the first foundry up and going, but need more than that. Oh and all the equipment making and handling the wafers, then handling the packaged parts… not cheap, and likewise, I don’t think those are made in the USA either.
 
B6_Dolphin said:
Yeah, well, it's no different in other industries, like aerospace. Being GenX, I've quickly become one of the senior type in the organization - most of the baby boomers took voluntary retirement packages during/right-after Covid. The 20-something replacements last about two years, and then move-on for a variety of reasons, especially when some of the work, while important, doesn't achieve the (pre-conceived) level of excitement to keep them engaged on a day-to-day basis.
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I agree, alot of the industries that were shuttered or moved overseas in the past few decades are experiencing the same issues.
 
B6_Dolphin said:
Yeah, well, it's no different in other industries, like aerospace. Being GenX, I've quickly become one of the senior type in the organization - most of the baby boomers took voluntary retirement packages during/right-after Covid. The 20-something replacements last about two years, and then move-on for a variety of reasons, especially when some of the work, while important, doesn't achieve the (pre-conceived) level of excitement to keep them engaged on a day-to-day basis.
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I’ve seen that too. What I’m not sure is, is it bad that “kids today” want a better life-work balance. I recall as a kid in the 80’s reading about how America was wildly productive—but at the same time, we got the least number of vacation days per year, and didn’t bother taking all of them (as compared to other first world countries). Makes us very productive. And apt to die young.

Job hopping is the norm today, it’s expected to move around more. In some ways it may be the only way to climb the ladder. I’m not sure if companies are doing enough to move people around, move up the ladder, or across the company—one could say, that’s up to the employee to do, but at some point, when employers can’t get work done because of turnover, at what point does it become their problem to solve?

People no longer want work to be the definition of their life, living centered around their job. It’s hard to say where this is going, as it goes against the history of mankind.
 
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UncleDave said:
We don't value engineering or R&D either. We chose to force companies to capitalize it.

I can't this of a faster better way to drive it from the US as fast as possible.
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Chasing the almighty dollar. Racing to the bottom. Those are not cheap expenditures, and other countries are willing to do it cheaper than those in the US.

Companies also don't like to think long term. 10 years from now might as well be eternity--next quarter's results are where it's at.
 
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proveitwithdata said:
are there rules to the funding and how it can used for hiring purposes? I know tsmc had an issue finding onshore talent, dont know what happened to that?
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They sent people to their fab to both run them temporarily and train the onsite-employees.

The thing about TSMC is that they're heavily dependent on expat employees in Taiwan. I believe quite a few of the people who develop the processes and quality control at TSMC are Chinese-American, so that might help if they can bring them over. You know - no visa issues and perhaps no language barrier.
 
supton said:
Making wafers is one thing. Where are they going to be tested? packaged? tested again? Then actually used, you know, soldered down to a PCB (that likewise made in the USA) (and soldered in the US too).

Need a big investment to get the first foundry up and going, but need more than that. Oh and all the equipment making and handling the wafers, then handling the packaged parts… not cheap, and likewise, I don’t think those are made in the USA either.
Click to expand...

It's an international business. The big photolithography companies are Dutch (ASML) and Japanese (Nikon and Canon). However, a lot of the other equipment is American - Applied Materials and Lam Research. I think the big testing equipment companies include American companies. Not sure if Credence is still in business. I know Schlumberger is no longer in the automated test equipment business. I know they were a French company, but I took classes on semiconductor testing where the part-time instructor owned his own semiconductor testing support business and previously worked for Schlumberger at their Silicon Valley office.

I remember at many of my companies the wafers might be made one place but the cutting and packaging at another place. Packaging is mostly in Asia these days - Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, etc.

Our prototype boards might be made locally, but they were very expensive. We had a guy in Richmond, California who would make boards and could do the expensive rework on those prototype boards. We must have paid him enough since he would hand-deliver stuff to us and liked coming over to talk shop. It was really weird too since he always came by wearing his ESD smock, even though nobody in our lab ever wore one. This is very different than production boards though, where I think that's overwhelmingly done in Asia now.
 
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