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Comment by smachiz | Hacker News Reader

TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) is the largest contract manufacturer of complex CPUs there is.

They're building a massive fab in Phoenix.

Isn't dispersing a core business, that the global economy relies on, to other countries a bad move for Taiwan? If advanced micro chips are made in another country doesn't that mean China might be more likely to use a forceful invasion and other countries can say "Yes, this is terrible - but at least we still have our chips!"

Taiwan doesn't own TSMC. They don't tell TSMC how to do business any more than the US government dictates to Intel. I'm sure it wields influence, of course. The US government offers incentives for companies to build foundries in the US, and there's a large pool of skilled workers in the industry in that area. Also Taiwan is a small country, so it's quite possible TSMC needs to expand internationally in order to be able to scale up it's business.

TSMC was founded as a Taiwan government initiative, the government still owns 6% and has a representative on the board of directors.

Sure, but the US gov't provided no seed money or had any role otherwise in founding of Intel, unlike TSMC. Up until recently the US chips companies were pretty much on their own without much special pampering. TSMC has little or no desire to expand beyond their tiny island -- not only b/c of the gov't investment's national stake in TSMC, but also TSMC's business model doesn't work -- and certainly can't maintain its fat profit marign -- without gov't largess and econ protection.

Yeah I do wonder about this. Atm, US is putting on immense pressure on chip manufacturers and their countries to control the supply and add factories in US soil.

Once the factories are built, would US be as invested in defending Taiwan and further, South Korea? I know US won’t give them up easily, but when push comes to shove … I don’t know.

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