Spain To Invest $13 Billion To Build Microchip Industry (apnews.com) 34
The Spanish government on Tuesday announced plans to invest $13.2 billion to build microchips in the country and "help reduce the dependence of Span and the European Union on other suppliers," reports the Associated Press. From the report: Speaking in Madrid, Deputy Prime Minister and Economy Minister Nadia Calvino said the five-year plan is aimed at enabling Spain to cover every area in the design and production of microchips, which are now considered key to all areas of modern industry. She said the plan was among the most ambitious of the Spanish government's projects to reboot the economy after the COVID-19 pandemic and that it would have an effect on other sectors.
The project was directed at boosting the EU's weak position in microchip production, which Calvino said represented some 10% of the world total. She said this led to a great dependence on a small number of major producers such as Taiwan, the United States, South Korea, Japan and China. Calvino added that "the war in Ukraine makes it a priority to reinforce strategic autonomy in energy, technology, food production as well as cyber security."
The project was directed at boosting the EU's weak position in microchip production, which Calvino said represented some 10% of the world total. She said this led to a great dependence on a small number of major producers such as Taiwan, the United States, South Korea, Japan and China. Calvino added that "the war in Ukraine makes it a priority to reinforce strategic autonomy in energy, technology, food production as well as cyber security."
Can't blame them (Score:4)
Re:Can't blame them (Score:5, Interesting)
IC fabs specialize. So Spanish taxpayers will pay 12B euros to subsidize a fab that will produce almost entirely for export while making little difference to Spain's dependence on foreign IC suppliers.
Re: Can't blame them (Score:2)
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The plan is to create a semiconductor cluster. It's EU money (NextGenerationEU) earmarked for R&D, digital and green technologies.
Let me explain ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Careful analysis of the contract will say, "You give me money. We promise sky and earth. But absolutely no penalty for not delivering either the sky, or the earth or both or neither or anything of value real or imagined, stated or understood, ..."
Re: Let me explain ... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: Let me explain ... (Score:2)
Re: Let me explain ... (Score:4, Informative)
TSMC's 300,000 sqft fab is under construction in Phoenix, Arizona.
Samsung has started construction of an even bigger fab in Texas.
So far, they are doing what they promised.
Re: Let me explain ... (Score:2)
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Spain is going to give 13 billion dollars to a bunch of suits promising to build a chip foundary creating thousands of jobs and billions of dollars of export.
Careful analysis of the contract will say, "You give me money. We promise sky and earth. But absolutely no penalty for not delivering either the sky, or the earth or both or neither or anything of value real or imagined, stated or understood, ..."
You didn't explain anything. All you did was regurgitate slogans and verbal hand waving.
Staffed by..? (Score:2)
But who is going to do the work in the factories?
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But who is going to do the work in the factories?
Bands of mariachis, who else?
Spanish blue collar workers? (Score:1)
TSMC CEO explained that one difficulty in building a fab in the US is that they cannot find enough blue collar workers that are as hard-working as they can find in Asia. Of course price is one factor, if they raise the pay enough to hire enough workers, then the each chip will costs something like 3x as much.
Anyone thinks Spanish blue collar workers could be any better/cheaper? How would Spain like a fab that produce chips at 3x the cost? Are they going to force their local businesses to only buy local c
Re:Spanish blue collar workers? (Score:4, Insightful)
Cheaper than the USA? I picked the first blue collar job which came to mind: according to talent.com, "The average amazon warehouse worker salary in the USA is $31,460 per year". At today's exchange rate that's about 29,400 EUR. For comparison, according to salary.com "The average Warehouse Worker salary in Spain is €21,270 as of April 08, 2021". Not a third, but certainly less, and to be honest I'm surprised it's that high because there are a lot of people in Spain who earn only about 12,000 EUR ("mileuristas").
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The cost for that worker is more like €39,000, since the employer has to pay additional costs on top of the salary.
But considering that those costs also provide the employee with unemployment insurance, a retirement plan, paid vacations, and insurance for work-related accidents and occupational illnesses, it's still a damn good deal.
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there are a lot of people in Spain who earn only about 12,000 EUR ("mileuristas")
The Spanish (gross) minimum wage is 14,000 EUR/year. Even somebody without young children or any other discount is going to be closer to 13,000 EUR/year net than 12,000 EUR/year net.
The monthly gross minimum wage is indeed 1,000 EUR/year, but that's counting 14 payments/year.
The "mileurista" term has been used at least since 2005 (https://elpais.com/diario/2005/08/21/opinion/1124575203_850215.html), 17 years ago! Salaries have changed since then.
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What layout software? Are you talking about Verilog? That is a common skill. Done some myself.
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Not operate. Create.
Are you referring to the software made by Xilinx and Altera?
They have way more than 20 people working on their software and they are both global companies with employees in Ireland, China, Japan, Singapore, India, etc.
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Relevant information missing: Intel lab (Score:5, Interesting)
Two details are very relevant and missing from the information:
First, within the frame of this plan, Intel has agreed to establish a joint processor lab, in collaboration with the Barcelona Supercomputing Center [www.bsc.es]. Note that this is one of the most renowned HPC centers in Europe (and worldwide). This has been announced [twitter.com] by the President of Spain himself. The budget will be 400M€ for ten years (50% investment by Intel, 50% by the Spanish government), not large for processor development, but not negligible at all.
Second, this processor lab will will focus on RISC-V architectures, not x86. Note that Intel already licensed SiFive RISC-V portfolio for Intel Foundry Services [slashdot.org] last year and they joined the RISC-V foundation [slashdot.org] three months ago.
Again? (Score:2)
Good idea to make them in many places. (Score:2)
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The current chip manufacturing system is very, very stupid and tenuous. Yes, you won't have the same costs everywhere, but it's absurd to let the entire world economy rest on a handful of factories.
A good point, this is an area where government subsidies might be a very good idea over simply letting the market decide.
The nature of the industry probably means it's most cost effective to have one or two highly centralized big players. For an individual customer hedging your bets isn't really cost feasible, but for a nation, you want to ensure critical components have redundant suppliers.
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We should have invested in marijuana (Score:1)