SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Senate passes massive package to boost U.S. computer chip production
[....] The 64-33 vote represents a rare bipartisan victory a little more than three months before the crucial November midterms; 17 Republicans joined all Democrats in voting yes. The package, known as "CHIPS-plus," now heads to the House, which is expected to pass it by the end of the week and send it to President Joe Biden for his signature.
[....] The centerpiece of the package is more than $50 billion in subsidies for domestic semiconductor manufacturing and research.
Supporters on Capitol Hill, as well as key members of Biden's Cabinet, have argued that making microchips at home — rather than relying on chipmakers in China, Taiwan and elsewhere — is critical to U.S. national security, especially when it comes to chips used for weapons and military equipment.
[...] The final chips bill is a slimmed-down version of a much broader China competitiveness package that House and Senate lawmakers had been negotiating. Earlier, the Senate passed its bill, known as USICA, while the House passed its own version, the America COMPETES Act. But lawmakers couldn't resolve their differences, and leading Democrats decided to switch their strategy and scale back the legislation.
The package also includes tens of billions more in authorizations for science and research programs, as well as for regional technology hubs around the country.
If passed, will this be well spent? Will the US actually be globally competitive in chip manufacture?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2022, @06:24PM (1 child)
"the US won't become dependent on just China for the supply chain"
BFD. I don't see a bailout of any of the other electronics components you need.
"Intel made it explicitly clear their intention behind this bailout bill"
Says it all. It smells just like the United Airlines pork-feed.
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Friday July 29 2022, @11:13PM
We can source everything else from everywhere else. However, wafers aren't commodities since wafer growing is a per fab's lithography process so the growers aren't willing to operate in over-supply conditions. So, that leaves you with either:
1. Parity for wafer growers.
2. Nationalization of wafer production.
3. Standardization and decentralization of wafer production.
4. Let/force Intel to go into wafer tooling and production and hope you won't end up with an even worse too-big-to-fail behemoth a few years from now.
5. Centralize management and subsidize the wafer production.
I think no1 would have been the best option since the production scale and times involves against the risks is basically the same as farming but there's literally no "oh no what about all the small farmers..." nonsense so the subsidies won't go crazy.
compiling...