jms_embedded
Active member
Interesting article predicting a culture clash in its Arizona fab-under-construction. Seems a bit of a premature statement to me, but it was an interesting read nevertheless.
EETimes: TSMC's Arizona Culture Clash
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coldsolder215
Active member
The first movie Obama's production company picked up, "American Factory" was about how Americans are too stupid and lazy and their fingers too chubby to ever meet the standards of any Chinese manufacturing operation. It's obvious why that kind of narrative appeals to the O'bungler, because his speaking fees are predicated on people thinking he was a cool, effective, metrosexual Kenyan president who did good stuff and not just another neoliberal chickenhawk responsible for managing our decline.
jms_embedded
Active member
Partisan bickering isn't really on-topic here.
coldsolder215
Active member
That's your projection I hate all US politicians equally, and last I checked American partisanship is the only reason TSMC is bothering with AZ at all.
Dan Clein
New member
The article is very realistic but one thing is missing in it: Why is TSMC investing is US? Is it money? Is it market expansion? Is it resource augmentation? Or is the US guarding Taiwan against China? Or the fact that in case China does enter Taiwan where is TSMC without external fab capacity? Security is more important than money, the US army can vouch for that.
These are strategic reasons and when defence steps in any industry the rules of free market and profits bend... So they will adapt and survive like any other reverse-outsourcing business... If AI is progressing as per forecast the price of robots will be the same in US or elsewhere, like in car industry today...
The article is excessively exaggerating, trying to paint a picture that Americans are lazy and unwilling to work hard. Nothing can be further from the truth. I have not met a single person in my 30 yrs in the tech industry who insist (or is able to) just working 9-5 and 5 days a week, unless she/he is at the bottom of the ladder and has zero aspiration and is thus required to punch a clock time stamp everyday going in and out the building. In reality, it's common working 50, 60 or more hours a week if that person has just a tiny bit of ambition for getting ahead or a better pay. If an engineer insisting on 40 hours week with a rigid schedule as described in the article, I am not sure she/he is even employable in today's environment, frankly. Why you would ever want to hire such a person?
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Because fabs don't just hire engineers and software developers. Most of the labor in the construction and operation of a fab is going to be construction workers, line workers, technicians, and maintenance people. It's also not that Americans are not willing to work hard, there is a different standard in Asian factories.
In Asia, the factory workers live at factory dorms, they wake up, have a small meal, and go work 12 hours. They come home, have another meal, maybe socialize a bit with other factory workers for a bit, go to sleep and repeat. When they work, they work like machines, doing repetitive tasks perfectly over and over and over again. They do that all day every day, with very few breaks, maybe a couple days off a month but no weekends, and then get a week off for Chinese new years. Do you think American workers will do that? Absolutely not.
The article implies that TSMC went into Arizona without knowing the culture. I can assure you they did not. TSMC has been in San Jose CA since the beginning. The majority of TSMC's customers are US based, some of which have groups in Taiwan (QCOM, Apple, Nvidia, Intel, etc...). TSMC is well versed in US culture. Anyone that suggests otherwise is grossly underestimating the TSMC executive staff, most of which are educated in the US.