Is globalisation going back to localisation and centralisation?

The US government announced the Chips and Science Act of 2022 to strengthen the chips supply chain and provide more STEM job opportunities to Americans.

The UK Digital Strategy sets semiconductors and advanced computing as critical supply chains and builds partnerships with the US government.

The European Commission proposed the Chips Act in Feb. 2022 to enhance productivity and technology leadership. Then, the Commission approved the Italian measure to improve the semiconductor supply chain. To achieve the goals of digital and green transition.

Some advanced economies try to deindustrialization, keep the research and development in these developed countries and set manufacturing processes in less economically developed countries before 2022. The economic activity is called the "global division of labour."

But these national and regional strategies or bills seem to make the whole manufacturing process in the local country or the region and try to decouple with some controversial countries.

https://www.usitc.gov/press_room/news_release/2022/er1014ll1999.htm

Finally, after several days shutdown, I can see the original message from the US government.

Title: The German Chancellor will visit Beijing to push human rights and an open market

The German Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, will visit Beijing on Nov 4. The trip aims to discuss human rights and push an open market. The Chancellor will probably focus on establishing a mutually beneficial business relationship between Germany and China, especially for all European and enterprises. (link)

The German government allowed the Chinese shipping company to set up a terminal in Hamburg. The government is still assessing a Sweden company's acquisition of a small-scale, German-based semiconductor company with €85 million. The Sweden company is owned by one of the Chinese microchip manufacturers. (link)

The U.S. Government published the rule to restrict chips in advanced technology export to Chinese entities in Oct. To prevent the Chinese government uses advanced chips in military applications. Chinese enterprises begin to search for any opportunity to own the chip technology to prosper their technical development, i.e., supercomputer, artificial intelligence, autonomy technology and aerospace technology. Many related companies have stopped providing services or materials to Chinese companies.

Title: The U.S. BIS announced new Export Administration Regulations for national security and foreign policy concerned https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2022/10/13/2022-21658/implementation-of-additional-export-controls-certain-advanced-computing-and-semiconductor

The US Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) is concerned about its national security and foreign policy. The BIS made critical changes to the Export Administration Regulations (EAR).

Based on the published document, advanced integrated circuits (ICs) used in supercomputing, semiconductor manufacturing in ICs, software, and technology in new advanced computing and military defense usage are in the EAR. They need to apply for export permission. The document also listed twenty-eight entities in China which were identified for the national security and foreign policy concerned.

The US BIS knows the new rule will impact to the supply chain, they also set two changes to minimize the short term impact on the supply chains. The new rule gives some companies a one-year waiver to produce their products in China .

||VladaR|| This is for follow-up with semi-conductor 'watch'. There is a new concrete initiative by USA and EU.

Very interesting text which talks about the limits of further scaling of transistors on a chip. Will we soon have to live with the same iPhone for 10 years or more?

In a nutshell, as we approach 2nm technology (TSMC is working on 3nm), we will face limitations of physics, where we won't be able to scale further with the current technology. The semiconductor technology that we developed since 50s reaches its ends.

We will need a tectonic innovation (quantum perhaps? but it also relies on current semiconductors' technology in some proposals). Otherwise, we won't be able to get faster chips any more.

How will this impact the development of chips and geopolitics around this? How will this impact innovations?

||JovanK||

Could this be the next rift in the western positions - on where chip export rules should be drafted? ||JovanK|| ||MariliaM||