Thursday, October 7th 2021
Intel CEO Cites Brexit as Reason for Chip Fab Plans in UK Not an Option
In an interview with the BBC, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger said that the company is no longer considering the UK as a site for a chip fab, due to Brexit, something the company had apparently done prior to Brexit. Now the company is looking for a location in another EU country for a US$95 billion investment for a new semiconductor plant, as well as upgrades to its current plants in Ireland.
Although Intel had not made any firm decisions on a site location prior to Brexit, Gelsinger is quoted as saying "I have no idea whether we would have had a superior site from the UK, but we now have about 70 proposals for sites across Europe from maybe 10 different countries." He continues "We're hopeful that we'll get to agreement on a site, as well as support from the EU... before the end of this year."Gelsinger also talked about the current chip production imbalance in the world, pointing out that the US only produces some 12 percent of the world's semiconductors, whereas Samsung and TSMC combined, account for nearly 70 percent of the global supply. As such, Intel, as well as US and European politicians want to see a shift towards more locally produced semiconductors. Much of this is in the name of national security, but then you'd expect there to be a push for a lot more things to be produced locally in addition to just semiconductors.
There's no doubt that Intel's new-ish CEO likes to make bold statements, as he's quoted saying "This is an industry that we created in the US, Intel's the company that puts silicon into Silicon Valley," when asked if Intel can maintain its leading edge versus its Asian competitors. In all fairness, he continues "But we realise these are good companies, they're well capitalised, they're investing, they're innovating together. So we have to re-earn that right of unquestioned leadership."
In the same interview, he states that he's not expecting the current chip shortage to stabilise until 2023, although things should apparently improve come next year. In other words, expect a lot of soft packages from Santa this year and maybe even next year.
Source:
BBC News
Although Intel had not made any firm decisions on a site location prior to Brexit, Gelsinger is quoted as saying "I have no idea whether we would have had a superior site from the UK, but we now have about 70 proposals for sites across Europe from maybe 10 different countries." He continues "We're hopeful that we'll get to agreement on a site, as well as support from the EU... before the end of this year."Gelsinger also talked about the current chip production imbalance in the world, pointing out that the US only produces some 12 percent of the world's semiconductors, whereas Samsung and TSMC combined, account for nearly 70 percent of the global supply. As such, Intel, as well as US and European politicians want to see a shift towards more locally produced semiconductors. Much of this is in the name of national security, but then you'd expect there to be a push for a lot more things to be produced locally in addition to just semiconductors.
There's no doubt that Intel's new-ish CEO likes to make bold statements, as he's quoted saying "This is an industry that we created in the US, Intel's the company that puts silicon into Silicon Valley," when asked if Intel can maintain its leading edge versus its Asian competitors. In all fairness, he continues "But we realise these are good companies, they're well capitalised, they're investing, they're innovating together. So we have to re-earn that right of unquestioned leadership."
In the same interview, he states that he's not expecting the current chip shortage to stabilise until 2023, although things should apparently improve come next year. In other words, expect a lot of soft packages from Santa this year and maybe even next year.
110 Comments on Intel CEO Cites Brexit as Reason for Chip Fab Plans in UK Not an Option
news.sky.com/story/cameron-personally-requested-obamas-back-of-the-queue-brexit-warning-11423669
If you ask the Brits now if they want to get rid of Boris, they'll say yes. Even I will. But then the next a-hole comes around who craps all over us even more. That's democracy for you.
the 4th ReichBrussels/Berlin calling the shots either, but purposefully missing out on being part of one of the world's largest economic entities is a whole different thing. What they did wrong is they used the negative side of immigration to incite hate against the EU, and then used the angry mob's vote as an excuse to leave. It's called manipulation, that's what they did wrong, and that's why I'm saying that democracy doesn't work. The majority's opinion will always correlate to what they see and hear in the (government-controlled) media, which makes voting totally pointless.just read this tonight. at the bottom of this article just posted tonight... China is threatening to invade Taiwan in 2025 (a Taiwan minister claims)
crazy as ****. i really hope we don't see WW3 in our lifetime, ffs can't we all just get along and have a wank before bed. and some ice cream. i mean seriously that's all we need at the end of the day. LOL hypersonic missiles are the future, not nuclear submarines. the race is on to who gets there first. Russia already claims to have one but no one knows for sure. USA and China also very close to getting hypersonic missiles, will make traditional nukes obsolete, and we will enter a new cold war 3.0.
/OOT
One can absolutely argue that the EU has some deeply problematic sides, but saying that a poorly (or not at all) thought out "independence" movement fuelled by xenophobia, gross misrepresentations of truth ("Britain sends the EU X amount of money" implying that they get nothing nearly equivalent back; "EU immigrants are taking our jobs" while those jobs are generally not wanted by brits; etc.) and a political climate focusing on conflict and sensationalism rather than informing the public and debating the topic is somehow better, or less problematic than the EU? Yeah, sorry, you're going to have to back that up somehow. Again: you're claiming that this is an expressly punitive action by the US, that they have made a concrete deal with Intel to not invest in Britain due to Brexit. That is in no way the same as saying "If you do this, trade is going to suffer, and we can't prioritize you like we have been". If you can't understand the difference between those two, then I really can't help you. Lowering or removing support is not even close to the same as taking further punitive action. To put it into a metaphor that you might understand: If I've been buying all my fruit from your store, but say that I will no longer do so because of your actions, that is equivalent to what the US said in the source you quoted. What you are claiming is that they will mo longer do so, but will also go to all their friends and acquaintances and tell them to not buy fruit from you as well. There is nothing in the source you shared indicating that the latter is the case. And further, as I said, this would be tantamount to a trade war: implementing punitive trade sanctions towards another country. And while the US does love their trade wars, I sincerely doubt they'd want to sour relations to perhaps their closest international military and diplomatic ally through doing that against them. That would be pretty idiotic.
The EU is running a punitive campaign to make the UK irrelevant in all European matters (let me just mention that the EU <> Europe), because it is in a fight for its own survival. The UK needs to be made an example to all would-be Brussels detractors. Brexit is the latest marketing moniker for everything negative about the UK.
Sadly, for all of Europe's "fairness" and "openness", the smear campaign is real. EU politicians openly make disparaging comments about the UK and the British people on account of Brexit, and then are two-faced about it when they rely on Britons to visit their country as tourists.
On the other hand, the EU opposition to Nvidia's ARM takeover is a direct consequence of Brexit. The EU is afraid the bloc loses access to that IP, as ARM is headquartered in the UK. It will force Nvidia's hand to allow the IP to circulate and maybe even be re-headquartered in an EU country, rather than the UK. They won't make the claim outright, as the UK Competition & Markets Authority could nix the deal too, but they'll force Nvidia to provide guarantees the EU bloc isn't left out to dry.
Just wait and see
It is evil in its nature, everything with Nvidia, by the way.
The world will be a better place without this company.
regardless I care not, for I am leaving this site soon as I am now going from 52 hr work weeks to close to 70 and possibly buying my first house very soon.
You could always discuss why parts of the British political system were staunchly opposed to EU membership (which I for the most part would put down to a mixture of misguided nostalgia for imperialist Britain, a strong xenophobic undercurrent, and a strong desire for less oversight by a certain class of the super-rich - but to be clear, this reasoning applies to those in power, not the populace at large), and some fraction of this can no doubt be attributed to the EU's core democratic problems, but attributing the majority of blame for Brexit on the EU is frankly ridiculous.
I'm by no means an out-and-out EU supporter - I would say I'm deeply ambiguous about it on many, many levels - but in this case you're essentially arguing that the EU should be gracious and generous towards someone who, in effect, stood up, shouted "screw all of you a**holes", and walked backwards out the door with both middle fingers raised towards the room. Why on earth would the EU have any incentive to not be reticent towards further cooperation with Britain?
As for that two-facedness, doesn't that go both ways? Aren't the British people and government deeply two-faced by saying "we really don't want to cooperate with you, but we want to sell our goods to you and travel to your countries as tourists"?
That's the thing: The EU doesn't need to change anything to make the UK irrelevant. Voluntarily leaving the biggest cooperative governmental entity on the planet does that all on its own. The EU might be kicking them while they're down, but the faceplant that preceded this was entirely the UK's fault. Britain chose to not try and improve the cooperative organization they were a part of, instead choosing to set out on their own and forge their own, new alliances. Despite warnings from literally everyone that this would not go well - as a single, mid-sized country they don't have much bargaining power, after all. They are now seeing just how difficult that choice was - just like they were warned. This is not reciprocity, this is normal and expected. What we are seeing is not mistreatment of the UK, it is the absence of preferential treatment - which parts of the British political class firmly believed they would get due to some misdirected, imagined "greatness" that they held onto. That this didn't exist outside of their imaginations? That's their own fault. This, quite frankly, is absurd. It does not make sense logically. ARM is a British company. If nothing had happened, i.e. if Nvidia didn't want to buy them, they would be headquartered there for the foreseeable future. The status quo is ARM outside of the EU, as Brexit has happened. That is the current status quo. If the EU wants ARM in their territories, why would they oppose the one major and predictable change that might lead to a new HQ or more distributed presence? Your logic here does just not add up. A more reasonable argument would be opposing an Nvidia takeover to want to keep ARM headquartered in Europe (rather than it moving to, say, Taiwan). But then, due to Brexit, the EU has no self-serving incentive to do so - so if they are opposing the takeover, it can't logically be for self-serving reasons, if those reasons don't also include helping Britain keep ARM HQ'd there.
I'm not saying no-one is butthurt about it. I'm saying that it's a divorce and should be conducted in a civil manner.
As for the referendum being propagandist rhetoric, you're free to paint it any way you want. I saw scaremongering on both sides of the referendum, and not any different from any elections I've seen across Europe. Possibly the main difference was that there was (and still is) weak leadership on both sides.
As for... How is that absurd? As it stands, with the Nvidia takeover of ARM (and there is no reason for Nvidia to move the HQ from Cambridge), the UK would be in a position to tax companies in Europe when they license ARM IP, right? But the EU has the ability to sabotage the sale... So the EU uses this leverage to secure advantages for the bloc, going forward. It's a game. Nvidia has investors to account to. A $54bn that gets deflated because someone slams shut a >500 million consumer door is a big deal. No-one wants that to happen. Nvidia, UK or the EU. So they're now settling into the negotiation stage where the EU will try and get Nvidia to (I believe) open up labs in the EU and nominally "develop" something worthwhile there that the EU can claim to be "designed in the EU", just to avoid burying billions in a homebrew CPU architecture or RISC-V. I see this as the EU hedging its bets. You're free to disagree, of course.
Miss ya if you go man. You've always had an interesting take, but I get real life and all that.
Google is your friend...
"As of July 2021, the United Kingdom has concluded three new trade agreements: with Japan; with its biggest trading partner, the EU; and with Australia. In addition, it has agreed 35 'trade continuity agreements' (that replicate their pre-existing agreements with the EU) covering 67 nations by June 2021. In addition, it has begun other negotiations, notably to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership. The current Johnson ministry describes itself as a proponent of free trade.[1][2]"
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_agreements_of_the_United_Kingdom