Tag: Computer Chips

TSMC Chairman Mark Liu Says Company Will Keep Its Roots in Taiwan

Media Library

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, which is manufacturing the world’s most advanced microchips, conducts business on the island of Taiwan, dead center in one of the most geopolitically volatile places on the planet. That makes people in Washington very nervous. TSMC dominates the semiconductor industry; it’s a company that the United States can’t do without, 80 miles off the coast of China. The U.S. government has appropriated tens of billions of dollars to strengthen America’s own semiconductor sector and help fund TSMC’s nascent operations in the United States, far from China,…

The Chip Titan Whose Life’s Work Is at the Center of a Tech Cold War

Media Library

In a wood-paneled office overlooking Taipei and the jungle-covered mountains that surround the Taiwanese capital, Morris Chang recently pulled out an old book stamped with technicolor patterns. It was titled “Introduction to VLSI Systems,” a graduate-level textbook describing the intricacies of computer chip design. Mr. Chang, 92, held it up with reverence. “I want to show you the date of this book, 1980,” he said. The timing was important, he added, as it was “the earliest piece” in a puzzle that came together for him — altering not only his…

Looming U.S. Investment Restrictions on China Threaten Diplomatic Outreach

Media Library

Efforts to ease tensions between the United States and China through a series of diplomatic visits to Beijing could be undermined as the White House presses ahead with plans to impose new restrictions on American investments in Chinese companies involved in quantum computing, artificial intelligence and semiconductors. The looming restrictions were a central topic of discussion between Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen and senior Chinese officials during her four-day trip to China, which concluded on Sunday. The Treasury Department has sought to narrow the scope of the restrictions, which target…

Chips Make It Tough for the U.S. to Quit China

Media Library

In May, Micron Technologies, the Idaho chipmaker, suffered a serious blow as part of the U.S.-China technology war. The Chinese government barred companies that handle crucial information from buying Micron’s chips, saying the company had failed a cybersecurity review. Micron said the change could destroy roughly an eighth of its global revenue. Yet in June, the chipmaker announced that it would increase its investments in China — adding $600 million to expand a chip packaging facility in the Chinese city of Xian. “This investment project demonstrates Micron’s unwavering commitment to…

Biden Administration Weighs Further Curbs on Sales of A.I. Chips to China

Media Library

The Biden administration is weighing additional curbs on China’s ability to access critical technology, including restricting the sale of high-end chips used to power artificial intelligence, according to five people familiar with the deliberations. The curbs would clamp down on the sales to China of advanced chips made by companies like Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices and Intel, which are needed for the data centers that power artificial intelligence. Biden officials have said that China’s artificial intelligence capabilities could pose a national security threat to the United States by enhancing…

China Escalates U.S. Tech War With Micron Ban

Media Library

When cutting foreign technology companies from Chinese supply chains, Beijing has long chosen to work obliquely or even secretly. Regulators would give executives back-room lectures, weigh them down with excessive red tape or hit them with occasional office raids. Rarely did the government tell a firm outright it was no longer welcome. But that is what it signaled to Micron Technology in a late-night announcement on Sunday. The Chinese government banned companies that handle critical information from purchasing microchips made by the Boise, Idaho-based Micron. The company’s chips, which are…

China Bans Some Chip Sales of Micron, the US Company

Media Library

Beijing on Sunday told Chinese companies that deal with critical information to stop purchasing products from Micron Technology, the U.S.-based manufacturer of memory chips used in phones, computers and other electronics. Many analysts viewed the move as retaliation for Washington’s efforts to cut off China’s access to high-end chips. In a statement on its official social media site, the Cyberspace Administration of China said that in a cybersecurity review it had found that the chip maker’s products posed “relatively serious cybersecurity problems.” The problems could “seriously endanger the supply chain…

‘De-Americanize’: How China Is Remaking Its Chip Business

Media Library

Last October, construction plans for a hulking semiconductor factory owned by a major state-backed company in central China fell into disarray. The Biden administration had escalated the trade war over technology, severing China’s access to the Western tools and skilled workers it needed to build the most advanced semiconductors. Some employees with U.S. citizenship departed the company. Three U.S. equipment suppliers almost immediately halted their shipments and services, and Europe and Japan are expected to do the same soon. The facility belonged to Yangtze Memory Technologies Corporation, or YMTC, a…

Yellen to Call for ‘Constructive’ China Relationship

Chin@Strategy

WASHINGTON — Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen on Thursday will call for a “constructive” and “healthy” economic relationship between the United States and China, one in which the two nations work together to confront challenges like climate change, according to excerpts from prepared remarks. Ms. Yellen’s comments, which she will deliver at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies, will strike a notably positive tone about the U.S.-China relationship following months of heightened tensions between the two nations, which have the world’s largest economies. Ms. Yellen is expected to…

What is in the CHIPS Act, Aimed at Childcare Expansion and National Security

Chin@Strategy

The Biden administration unveiled new rules Tuesday for its “Chips for America” program to build up semiconductor research and manufacturing in the United States, beginning a new rush toward federal funding in the sector. The Commerce Department has $50 billion to hand out in the form of direct funding, federal loans and loan guarantees. It represents one of the largest federal investments in a single industry in decades and highlights deepening concern in Washington about America’s dependence on foreign chips. Given the huge cost of building highly advanced semiconductor facilities,…