shark975
Posts: 141 +179
Probably TBH #4 plays the least factor...He was probably a VERY hard worker in these young crucial years as well, which was likely many many times more important than #4 as lots of rich kids never amounted to anything.
How did TSMC get so good?
- Thread starter Jay Goldberg
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Probably TBH #4 plays the least factor...He was probably a VERY hard worker in these young crucial years as well, which was likely many many times more important than #4 as lots of rich kids never amounted to anything.
JamesBlond
Posts: 341 +228
Wish AMD and TSMC would join forces for the greater good, imagine the AMD processors hitting 5.5GHz and still having 10 cores more than intel
Mc Kinsey... last time I heard about them was a corruption scandal in France for the Macron's (who worked in Rothschild & Cie until 2012) re-election. Human capital, I guess. Sadly, the whole world is in the same mess, no corporation nor government cares about human capital, anywhere.
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Nintenboy01
Posts: 309 +215
Intel became far too complacent and it cost them dearly. They didn't capitalize on the time TSMC was stuck on 28nm for a while and 20nm wasn't very good
Hodor
Posts: 765 +512
I will assume your answer is a joke. In that case.... I agree
And I agree that lots of rich kids are useless, but in this specific case, lots of rich kids didn't have their mothers in the board of directors of IBM. So even if they wanted, they wouldn't have the advantage that Bill had.
Regarding his hard work, he was good in doing business. Which in this case consisted of paying $50,000 to a developer who actually developed MS-DOS (or PC-DOS, if you want IBM branding).
Young Gates had a nose for collecting money, he loves money more than anything, but it wouldn't help him without his mother being in the position she was. And without him being rich already. So that he can buy things he needed (in this case, an already finished operating system).
So the claims that he started from a garage....... was it a garage with a Bentley inside?
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TSMC is ready to give more for less...
In relation to why other large businesses have become better than anyone else?
It is said that ideas flow in the collective thought of the people, and when that idea emerges, it is a matter of time before someone puts it into practice. Who could have been quicker and better?
The one that was prepared for success, or that had sufficient support when the opportunity presented itself.
They say everybody has one big chance in life, and either they take it or they blow it up without knowing it.
Most of the companies are afraid of putting those great ideas out there, because they fear someone else is gonna grab their idea, or that the idea itself is not gonna be of success. Take for instance the games, the big aaa companies are ready to follow these ideas of creative people, and put them in work... Why? Because they have the resources to recreate and try again, pick the best.
In relation to why other large businesses have become better than anyone else?
It is said that ideas flow in the collective thought of the people, and when that idea emerges, it is a matter of time before someone puts it into practice. Who could have been quicker and better?
The one that was prepared for success, or that had sufficient support when the opportunity presented itself.
They say everybody has one big chance in life, and either they take it or they blow it up without knowing it.
Most of the companies are afraid of putting those great ideas out there, because they fear someone else is gonna grab their idea, or that the idea itself is not gonna be of success. Take for instance the games, the big aaa companies are ready to follow these ideas of creative people, and put them in work... Why? Because they have the resources to recreate and try again, pick the best.
There are three keys to TSMC's success: Specialization, Diversification, and Volume. These are the keys of the foundry model and TSMC is the king of the Foundries. First, by specializing only in manufacturing, rather than semiconductor design, TSMC was able to really focus on making their manufacturing process consistent, reliable, and efficient. When TSMC was founded, back in the 1980's, most of the leading semiconductor companies made their own designs. This left them vulnerable because they had to produce both a successful design and a successful manufacturing process. Any slip ups in either area, would cause them to be overtaken by the competition. They also had to worry about such things as 3rd party software support, marketing, standards adoption and so on. In other words, there was an entire landscape of potential landmines that TSMC (and UMC, which was bigger at the time) avoided by means of their business model.
The early TSMC processes were not particularly competitive. They focused on delivering older tech nodes, but at reduced costs. Cheap labor and government support were key for cost reduction. This allowed them to attract a number of customers, which brings up the next key, Diversification. Early customers tended to be established semiconductor companies like Motorola, Texas Instruments, and Phillips (NXP), which were more than happy to transfer their older designs to TSMC in order to free up their leading edge fabs for newer designs. Throughout the nineties this gave TSMC experience in transitioning from node to node across technologies. Often their customers would even help them make advances, since they were still a few nodes behind and not considered a competitive threat. As TSMC's manufacturing prowess improved, they attracted fabless companies like Qualcomm, Broadcom, MediaTek and so on. Here, they had a clear advantage, since the fabless companies would rather work with a pure-play foundry than have to go to one of their competitors for production services. The Fabless/Foundry model enabled the fabless companies to become more successful, which in turn ramped up the number of such companies, contributing to the customer diversification. Of course, some fabless companies failed, but now there were enough that some would always be successful, which essentially guaranteed TSMC a diverse supply of successful customers, and immunized them against a design flop.
The success of fabless companies really exploded in the early 2000's, allowing TSMC to grow and achieve major volumes, the final key to their success. Fabs are extremely expensive, but the cost per wafer drops significantly as the fab gets bigger. Thus, with huge volumes come reduced production costs and ultimately, large profits. TSMC built giant fabs and became the low-cost leader. This left TSMC in the right place at the right time to capitalize on the emergence of the Smartphone, a huge market for their products. Smartphones also provided an application that would benefit from advanced technology nodes.
In the early 2000's Texas Instruments made the strategic decision to bow out of advanced node development and transferred their 90nm process to TSMC. In 2003 TSMC participated in the Crolles 2 Alliance with Phillips, ST Microelectronics, and Motorola to develop a 65nm process on 300mm wafers. By 2006, while they still trailed technology leaders like Intel and IBM, the gap had closed significantly. During this time Intel was not sitting on its laurels, in 2007 they introduced a "Replacement Metal Gate/High-K" process at the 45nm node, an achievement that astounded the rest of the industry, which had focused on and struggled with a "gate-first" high-k strategy. IBM and partners like AMD and Sony, were left at a significant disadvantage and were only able to close the gap with IBM's 32nm node in 2010. Around this time, TSMC focused on a fast follower strategy, essentially reverse engineering Intel's chips and copying their strategy as quickly as possible. By 2011, they were able to release a 28nm technology that has perhaps been their most economically successful node to date. This left them able to invest significant sums of money in future development, setting them up to catch up to and then surpass Intel.
In 2012 Intel made another huge leap by introducing finfets at the 22nm node. Samsung, Globalfoundries, and TSMC all copied Intel, releasing so-called 14nm or 16nm nodes that were closer in performance to Intel's 22nm node in 2014/15. While inferior to Intel's 14nm node, Globalfoundries' technology was good enough, to enable AMD's superior "Zen" design to give Intel a serious run for its money. AMD gained market share and the race was on for a 7nm finfet process. Similarly, TSMC's 16nm process was competitive enough to enable Nvidia's GPU's to make serious inroads on the supercomputing and high-performance-computing front. Strengthening competition as well as softening demand for personal computers in the smart phone era, meant that Intel faced some serious headwinds. In 2016, TSMC released a 10nm technology that was more or less at parity with Intel's concurrent 14nm process. Intel struggled to release it's own 10nm node, by 2018 they were able to produce some low power 10nm chips for laptops, but they weren't able to yield the more profitable high performance server chips. Meanwhile, TSMC took the technology lead with their 7nm process introduced at the end of 2018. Since then, Intel has seemed to stall, they are only now ramping production of desktop CPUs on their 10nm process. TSMC has continued to make progress with 5nm currently in production and 3nm to be released soon. IBM dropped out of manufacturing in 2015, but have partnered with Samsung on R&D and have a 2nm process in the works, which should keep things interesting. Meanwhile, Intel is refocusing and will hopefully get back into the game soon, although they are also gearing up to use TSMC for some of their production.
The early TSMC processes were not particularly competitive. They focused on delivering older tech nodes, but at reduced costs. Cheap labor and government support were key for cost reduction. This allowed them to attract a number of customers, which brings up the next key, Diversification. Early customers tended to be established semiconductor companies like Motorola, Texas Instruments, and Phillips (NXP), which were more than happy to transfer their older designs to TSMC in order to free up their leading edge fabs for newer designs. Throughout the nineties this gave TSMC experience in transitioning from node to node across technologies. Often their customers would even help them make advances, since they were still a few nodes behind and not considered a competitive threat. As TSMC's manufacturing prowess improved, they attracted fabless companies like Qualcomm, Broadcom, MediaTek and so on. Here, they had a clear advantage, since the fabless companies would rather work with a pure-play foundry than have to go to one of their competitors for production services. The Fabless/Foundry model enabled the fabless companies to become more successful, which in turn ramped up the number of such companies, contributing to the customer diversification. Of course, some fabless companies failed, but now there were enough that some would always be successful, which essentially guaranteed TSMC a diverse supply of successful customers, and immunized them against a design flop.
The success of fabless companies really exploded in the early 2000's, allowing TSMC to grow and achieve major volumes, the final key to their success. Fabs are extremely expensive, but the cost per wafer drops significantly as the fab gets bigger. Thus, with huge volumes come reduced production costs and ultimately, large profits. TSMC built giant fabs and became the low-cost leader. This left TSMC in the right place at the right time to capitalize on the emergence of the Smartphone, a huge market for their products. Smartphones also provided an application that would benefit from advanced technology nodes.
In the early 2000's Texas Instruments made the strategic decision to bow out of advanced node development and transferred their 90nm process to TSMC. In 2003 TSMC participated in the Crolles 2 Alliance with Phillips, ST Microelectronics, and Motorola to develop a 65nm process on 300mm wafers. By 2006, while they still trailed technology leaders like Intel and IBM, the gap had closed significantly. During this time Intel was not sitting on its laurels, in 2007 they introduced a "Replacement Metal Gate/High-K" process at the 45nm node, an achievement that astounded the rest of the industry, which had focused on and struggled with a "gate-first" high-k strategy. IBM and partners like AMD and Sony, were left at a significant disadvantage and were only able to close the gap with IBM's 32nm node in 2010. Around this time, TSMC focused on a fast follower strategy, essentially reverse engineering Intel's chips and copying their strategy as quickly as possible. By 2011, they were able to release a 28nm technology that has perhaps been their most economically successful node to date. This left them able to invest significant sums of money in future development, setting them up to catch up to and then surpass Intel.
In 2012 Intel made another huge leap by introducing finfets at the 22nm node. Samsung, Globalfoundries, and TSMC all copied Intel, releasing so-called 14nm or 16nm nodes that were closer in performance to Intel's 22nm node in 2014/15. While inferior to Intel's 14nm node, Globalfoundries' technology was good enough, to enable AMD's superior "Zen" design to give Intel a serious run for its money. AMD gained market share and the race was on for a 7nm finfet process. Similarly, TSMC's 16nm process was competitive enough to enable Nvidia's GPU's to make serious inroads on the supercomputing and high-performance-computing front. Strengthening competition as well as softening demand for personal computers in the smart phone era, meant that Intel faced some serious headwinds. In 2016, TSMC released a 10nm technology that was more or less at parity with Intel's concurrent 14nm process. Intel struggled to release it's own 10nm node, by 2018 they were able to produce some low power 10nm chips for laptops, but they weren't able to yield the more profitable high performance server chips. Meanwhile, TSMC took the technology lead with their 7nm process introduced at the end of 2018. Since then, Intel has seemed to stall, they are only now ramping production of desktop CPUs on their 10nm process. TSMC has continued to make progress with 5nm currently in production and 3nm to be released soon. IBM dropped out of manufacturing in 2015, but have partnered with Samsung on R&D and have a 2nm process in the works, which should keep things interesting. Meanwhile, Intel is refocusing and will hopefully get back into the game soon, although they are also gearing up to use TSMC for some of their production.
Intel was the clear leader until around 2016 when TSMC's 10nm process more or less achieved parity with Intel. Even then, Intel produced many more advanced high-end chips. TSMC didn't really take the lead until their 7nm process came online in 2019. Intel had all of those pieces in place in 2019, do you think they just forgot how to supply ultra pure chemicals and such? No way. The problem was more about economics. Intel faced strong headwinds, including increasing competition from AMD and NVidia, and softening consumer demand for high end computers. At the same time, TSMC faced a growing high-end smartphone market and a pathway through AMD and NVidia, as well as custom chips for Amazon, Facebook, and Google, to encroach directly into Intel's bread and butter CPU market share.
Great question. It's really all about economics. The smartphone boom has given TSMC a huge boost and an expanding market. At the same time, PC sales are down, especially high-end machines, as even low-end chips are sufficient for your average consumer. So, Intel has been facing both a shrinking (or slowly growing) market and fierce competition from AMD & NVidia, compared to TSMC's rapidly growing market. This has enabled TSMC to take more risks and make bigger bets, while Intel has been relatively conservative in their R&D investments. At the same time, TSMC is getting a diversity of high end designs from AMD, NVidia, Apple, Google, Facebook, and Amazon, while Intel is basically limited to its own design, so TSMC has more chances for commercial success.
Ben Myers
Posts: 323 +124
Bill Gates BOUGHT(!!!!) MS-DOS from its original developer, Tim Patterson. Bill Gates and friends back then met with IBM, whereas the owner of the competing CP/M, Gary Kildall, somehow managed to miss the meeting when IBM came to town. A two horse competition for an IBM contract became one horse when one horse broke down.
Gates was is and will be a brilliant man, but there is no external evidence of his programming skills. Family money bankrolled him, same as Musk. Gates has a lesser public ego than Musk, though.
Ben Myers
Posts: 323 +124
Intel suffers from one massive disadvantage in chip design and fabrication compared to TSMC. Intel is beholden to the US stock market, where making money in this quarter is far more important than long term growth. TSMC has been largely insulated from the whims of the US stock market. TSMC stock is traded on the less demanding Taiwan stock exchange. If you want to have an investment in TSMC in this country, you buy TSMC ADRs (American Depositary Receipts).
Other American tech hardware companies suffer from the same problem as Intel, a short term mentality induced by the US stock market. This also explains why this country no longer leads the world in chip FABRICATION equipment.
A most serious disadvantage of American capitalism is that our ability to think about the long term is abysmal, whether in business or in politics. Its only short term profits and what you can do for me today, never mind next year or 5 years hence.
Other American tech hardware companies suffer from the same problem as Intel, a short term mentality induced by the US stock market. This also explains why this country no longer leads the world in chip FABRICATION equipment.
A most serious disadvantage of American capitalism is that our ability to think about the long term is abysmal, whether in business or in politics. Its only short term profits and what you can do for me today, never mind next year or 5 years hence.
If that's true, how was Intel able to dominate the Semiconductor market from the late 1980s through the mid 2010's? Something changed over the past 15 years, leading to TSMC's rise. Most likely, its the emergence of the Smartphone, possibly in combination with the decline of the personal computer market.
Ben Myers
Posts: 323 +124
Insufficient Intel R&D? Inability to adjust quickly to changes in the market? Inability to think long term? These are all factors, too. I have no idea why Intel has struggled so badly to shrink its chip processes as TSMC has done. Something changed in the Intel corporate culture? Many questions about Intel, but I do not think a B-school case study would reveal useful answers about an engineering-oriented business.
I used to work with the biggest computer store Surcouf in Paris (which later couldn't survive the emerging internet market) in the early 2000's. Intel was #1 by simply paying the sellers to display and sell their products leaving competition aside. It was a time when Athlon CPUs were competitive but Intel's dirty trick would leave AMD products to informed customers exclusively.
Hodor
Posts: 765 +512
But Musk is much smarter when it comes to technology and future. He really understands technology, society and various behind the curtain connections. While Gates is primarily focused on money. He's good at copying ideas after they became successful, but his predictions about technology have always failed.
There's a list of funny quotes and predictions from him. More than 20 years ago he said that hardware will be free, while software will cost a lot of money. Seems that in many cases the opposite has happened. He said that that email will not gain traction when it appeared. He said something similar about the world wide web.
The latest one is from 2008 where he predicted that computer mouse will disappear in a few years. 13 years later I'm still using a computer mouse. It didn't disappear. It's not even transparent.
"Musk sold around $8.5 billion in stock in late April, pledging on April 29 “no further TSLA sales planned after today.” It was a pledge he couldn’t keep: On August 10, he sold another almost $7 billion. Once again he promised he was done selling, and once again, he reneged on that promise: On November 8, he sold some $4 billion; he cashed out another $3.6 billion on December 14."
"AI is more dangerous than the nuke..... let's implant you a chip in the brain."
"I love Bitcoin.... I hate Bitcoin."
"Twitter will be freedom of speech...... let's cancel the account about my jet."
These are not exact quotes but you'll get the idea.
Smart or not is not really relevant, the issue here is about the fact that some (all?) billionaires are very good at deceiving to fulfill their own agenda.
Hodor
Posts: 765 +512
Aside from BitCoin and Tesla stock manipulations, I wouldn't say Musk is doing the rest on purpose. If I was in his place I'd cancel the account about his jet too. Because it's very specific, aimed just at him. Or alternatively, I'd add accounts following jets, yachts and cars of other rich people, especially those who are directly attacking him (who also finance most of so called "NGO"s). If he did that, it would be a full-scale war. I think his solution was more peaceful.
It was selfish and practical. To create a direct conflict with the moneybags of the entire planet - Musk is certainly not crazy, although sometimes he tries to build a public clown out of himself. Don Quixote is long gone, as and Robin Hood. Putin is playing the Joker...
Interesting story.
Endymio
Posts: 2,662 +2,683
This rather fatuous remark was compelling enough to repeat? Companies like TI, Intel, and Fairchild were founded decades before TSMC, meaning they had far more "years of learning and process development". This statement (and the entire article) ignores why TSMC rose so high above them. In the case of Intel, the reasons are clear: Intel chose to keep its fabs a closed proprietary solution for its exclusive use, whereas TSMC marketed them to the entire world. Ultimately, this gave TSMC advantages in volume and design flexibility that Intel couldn't compete with (note that in recent years, Intel's been forced to follow TSMCs lead here)
Stuff and nonsense. No government can manipulate its currency over the scale of decades. Long-term exchange rates for a floating currency are driven entirely by the balance of trade. Taiwan is an island that exports essentially nothing but electronics and some machine tools -- it needs to import millions of other products. If it wasn't for semiconductors, Taiwan's currency wouldn't trade at a 30% discount to the dollar, but rather a 98% discount.
It's also worth pointing out that the last time Taiwan was accused of currency manipulation (early '21), its currency had just risen 6% against the dollar.
I can make one valuable observation - in all developing countries where the greedy American business came (and which were essentially recognized as the "Western" zone at the policy level) - the currency immediately stabilized, and its fluctuations became insignificant - because. business does not like this very much, where Hi-Tech production is concentrated due to extremely complex and long production chains.
The author makes the wrong assumption that ASML technologies are available to everyone. This is nonsense and easy to prove the opposite.
Except many other players also constantly try the "throw money at it" trick, but it's really not that simple. Money is just one of the many things you need to be this successful.
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