ary·ChipsFormer Intel board members: America’s champion is ly to retreat, and we still need a leading-edge chip manufacturerBy Charlene BarshefskyBy Reed HundtBy James PlummerBy David B.
YoffieBy Charlene BarshefskyBy Reed HundtSEE MORE Charlene Barshefsky is a former U.S. Trade Representative. Reed Hundt is a former chair of the FCC.
James Plummer is a former Dean of Engineering at Stanford. David B. Yoffie is a fessor at Harvard School. Ambassador Barshefsky, Mr.
Hundt, fessor Plummer, and fessor Yoffie all served as longtime directors on the Intel board. Co-author Charlene Barshefsky when she was serving in her capacity as U.S. Trade Representative.Scott J.
Ferrell/Congressional Quarterly/Getty ImagesA little over five years ago, the Trump administration announced Operation Warp Speed to der a vaccine for COVID-19.
It was one of the most stunning successes of Trump’s first term. Recognizing a crisis, the U.S. government facilitated a public-private partnership that ly d millions of s in record time.
Now we must do it again.
As a country, we have a strategic imperative to win in artificial intelligence and secure our supply chains for critical nologies, including communications, computing, and advanced military systems.
Time is of the essence. Yet the Administration’s plans for AI and self-sufficiency are in serious jeopardy unless we have American-owned, leading-edge chip manufacturing plants on American soil.
US advanced semiconductor manufacturing has been withering for some time. The once-leading Intel appears to be dropping out of the race.
Missed deadlines, poor execution, and a misguided strategy to retain manufacturing within Intel while also serving as a foundry for its fabless chip competitors resulted in a dearth of customers.
Recommendations (including those from the four of us) to split off Intel’s foundry and create a fully independent entity to supply its competitors, thereby giving itself a fighting chance, have never been adopted.
Intel appears to have only a few external customers for its current nology (called 18A), and the CEO recently said on July 24 that “Going forward, our investment in … [Intel’s most advanced cess nology, 14A will] be based on confirmed customer commitments,” continuing a model that has largely failed.
Unsurprisingly, the CEO also announced the shuttering of its plans for German and Polish plants, further delaying its posed Ohio plant, and a massive lay-off. More spending reductions will inevitably .
All of these announcements strongly imply a gradual exit from the chip manufacturing , turning Intel into a fabless company over time.
Given that Intel’s internal demand is no longer big enough to justify continued capital investment in leading-edge nology, this may be the right strategy for Intel.
Still, it is the wrong strategy for the United States.
With Intel’s ly retreat from advanced chip manufacturing, America’s future and the future of its leadership in AI and all advanced electronics will be firmly in the hands of two firms: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (TSMC) and Samsung, two firms headquartered on the other side of the planet.
TSMC is by far the dominant player, controlling over 90% of the world’s most advanced semiconductor manufacturing output.
The Taiwanese chip manufacturer duces nearly 100% of Nvidia’s GPUs, which are the engines that enable AI. It also manufactures most of the chips for iPhones and 5G communications.
While TSMC and Samsung have committed to building more plants in the U.S., these will not solve the blem. Neither company will bring its nology here.
The newest generation of chips must first be developed in a plant geographically close to its R&D teams. In the case of TSMC, those teams are in Taiwan; for Samsung, South Korea.
The only R&D team that has been advanced generation nologies on US soil, fabricated in the generation U.S.-owned plants, is Intel.
But as Intel retreats, America’s future in AI and other advanced nologies is increasingly reliant on a single firm, located a stone’s throw from mainland China.
To be sure, TSMC’s nological wess is impressive. Moreover, its mise to invest $100 billion in Arizona is laudable.
However, the fact is that we are giving TSMC too much power over the allocation of capacity, pricing, and human capital to drive AI into the future.
In the case of Taiwan, risk is compounded by the obvious geopolitical risks attendant to its . These dependencies are intolerable if the U.S.
is to tect its own economic and national security interests. Fortunately, the Trump Administration has dealt itself enough cards to rectify this obvious vulnerability.
The Administration recognizes that the United States needs advanced chip-making capabilities within our own country.
To this end, by executive order March 31, the President created the United States Investment Accelerator at the Department of Commerce.
It is responsible, among other things, for administering the CHIPS gram Office. Billions remain unspent from this Congressional gram.
Perhaps billions more can be retrieved from Intel, given its apparent surrender in the race with TSMC.
In addition to these billions, the Trump Administration on July 22 also wrested from Japan a commitment to invest more than $550 billion in the United States.
With CHIPS money, Japan’s partnership, and government investment —either direct or through Trump’s recent executive order to create a sovereign wealth fund —the federal government has the opportunity to launch “Operation Warp Speed II” and put America back on the leading edge of chip manufacturing.
Speed is essential: As Intel downsizes and lays off thousands of people, we are losing and will continue to lose the best people.
Soon, we will be without a viable foundation on which to build a new, world-class American foundry, for which Intel’s assets are critical.
Here’s a plan: First, similar to the first Operation Warp Speed, the Trump administration should build a public-private partnership, where future customers (e.g., Nvidia, Qualcomm, Broadcom, Google, Amazon, Apple and others), Japanese investors such as Softbank, and private equity, backed by government financing and/or investment, would buy Intel’s fabrication assets before the lack of investment and the rust of time makes them worthless and leave the United States dangerously dependent on a single manufacturing firm.
Second, the Trump administration has been very effective in persuading leading U.S. companies to invest in America’s future.
They should be encouraged to partner and invest in a new American Foundry and to buy from it.
Nvidia, Broadcom, Google, and others may have turned down Intel’s offering, but they cannot as easily turn down the opportunity to help create an independent, leading-edge domestic competitor to TSMC.
American companies want (and need) alternative sources of supply, and this plan can vide them.
Building a new American Foundry for advanced semiconductors is the best strategy to keep the United States and American firms at the leading edge of AI and advanced electronics, and to ensure that critical supply chains are not disrupted by geo, pandemics, or natural disasters.
There is no time to waste.
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