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alaricus

This is a very bad policy. We should instead invest in local companies, not a American monopoly like Intel.

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> This is a very bad policy. We should instead invest in local companies, not a American monopoly like Intel.

The origin of the company is irrelevant if they respect basic norms.

How exactly is "intel" a monopoly when Advanced Micro Devices Inc. is also American?

> The origin of the company is irrelevant if they respect basic norms.

This is not correct. American govenment has a habit of using American companies to push foreign policy objectives.

That hardly matters as American and EU foreign policy are almost completely aligned.

No they are not. The invasion of Iraq, the intervention of Syria, the destabilization of the Middle East are all things Europe strongly objects to.

Perhaps they were not, but things change.

Intel is far from a monopoly in the foundry business and is frankly, the only realistic option outside of TSMC to make this happen.

And the US does the same thing in terms of tax breaks for German automotive companies building manufacturing plants.

Which again, makes sense, because you want to make sure you have manufacturing across continents in case Russia invades Germany and blows up all of the auto plants (for example).

Russia is not going to invade Germany. Stop spreading nonsense.

Frankly, with NATO around they don’t Have to invade Germany to get Germany involved in a war - if they invade any NATO member, Germany will get involved, which means Germany is a target for retributive strikes.

You probably shouldn't be downvoted for that. Russia of the present, and for at least the next few decades, is entirely incapable of getting anywhere near staging an invasion of Germany. Russia and it's hyper incompetent military can't even make it a quarter of the way through Ukraine.

The best Russia could do is bomb Germany from a distance, which could pose a small threat to valuable infrastructure like fabs.

Unless they manage to do that zerg rush trick again.

You are very confident of that. I wouldn't be so confident of that.

We are - indirectly. Intel uses EUV machines provided by ASML.

The ASML machines Intel uses use EUV tech wich ASML acquired through their acquisition of Cymer, California and use licensed tech from Sandia Labs, also a US lab, meaning the US has full veto rights over to whom ASML gets to sell their EUV machines (spoiler alert, not to China).

> meaning the US has full veto rights over to whom ASML gets to sell their EUV machines (spoiler alert, not to China).

That's false. For USA to be able to block exports of the technology, more than 25% (if I remember correctly) of parts has to be of US origin. When the EUV program started, the share of US technology was much higher, but as the program progressed, it was diluted.

USA could still block sale of EUV machines, by refusing export/licensing of critical components, but they'd have to change their laws first.

Fact is that ASML voluntarily chose to block exports to China. In part because they want to keep good relations with USA. It's the US that funded the EUV program in the beginning after all. But I'm sure ASML was tired of China copying their stuff too, so it probably wasn't hard to convince them.

Intel was going to buy them anyway, regardless of where the fab is built.

Why? Germany doesn’t pursue political objectivity anyway.

I don't want my tax money filling the coffers of an American monopoly.

The alternative is that they take $5.5B from France and you lose the jobs.

Strategically, you want the semi jobs to seed local expertise.

You can invest 5.5 billion to create local companies, instead of subsidizing an American one.

If you want to create an Intel competitor from scratch that will be way, way more than 5.5 billions and will take a ridiculous amount of time.

You don't need to create an Intel competitor from scratch. For example the same money can be better invested in Infineon, ASML, Bosch or a number of local companies that work on chips. Or it could be put into RISC-V work.

I don’t get your point. What you describes sounds exactly like the goal of such a subsidy. With new Intel factories in Europe that means more demand for ASML and other European companies, given that they already collaborate. With the addition that you can now train Europeans and develop the industry locally.

My point is that as a taxpayer in Germany, I don't want to subsize an American company. Better to invest in local companies like Infineon or Bosch.

Americans feel your pain, given the subsidies German automakers have received to build plants in our country over the decades.

Mercedes got $260m in Alabama in the early 1990s, BMW got $150m in South Carolina in the early 1990s, Volkswagen got $570m in the late 2000s in Tennessee. That's close to $1.6 billion inflation adjusted from just three examples of it.

The US economy is six times the size of Germany's economy, so those are massive subsidies in relation.

I don't know about Infineon, but Bosch would boat anchor that money and then you'd just be out $5.5B. No way Bosch is going to be a world class fab provider.

Investing in those (other than ASML) just means the money will go to Taiwan/China. It's no more likely to stay in the EU.

5.5 billion will barely let you build a fab, if even that.

Why do you care about the origin of the company?

I consider it unethical for my tax euros to subsidize an American company.

where you think your tax euros go anyway? Now that germany will re-militarize, just expect to be a much larger amount going to american companies.

I question the sanity of our politicians that think putting German money into F35 is a good idea.

People living on democracy have right to question when their money is being spent in enriching the country which has habit of meddling foreign policy?

You can question whatever you want. That doesn’t answer why it matters that Intel has their HQ in the US.

It’s not like there is such a large choice of companies if you want to be able to produce chips in Europe.

Intel is subservient to American government. I don't want German taxpayer money going into an entity that is subservient to the American government.

For example, America has a habit of forcing American companies to push American foreign policy. For example: Google dropping Huawei.

What market is Intel a monopoly in?

They don't even have all of the x86 market. https://www.extremetech.com/computing/335650-amd-achieves-al...

If you want to buy a laptop/server than you pretty much have to choose between Intel and AMD. Thankfully, the world is slowly changing.

Understandable, but that’s why western liberal democracies have been established. G7 summits leave no room for this kind of reasoning.

> We should instead invest in local companies, not a American monopoly like Intel.

but they'll bring CPU/Semico talent to germany and other eu countries

then with talent you can start building your own start ups, dont ya?

Having an established player that trains and employs workers creates a pool of experienced workers in the area. Those are exactly the kinds of people to get a local competitor started.

There are lots of local semiconductor companies (Infineon, Bosch). This money would be better spent on them.

Yes, also at 18Bn it is a HUGE factory ehich will make the area more attractive for smaller players. I think and hope they know what they are doing

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