Ex-Intel CEO backs Trump's sovereign wealth fund plan — and says it can help the US keep up with China in the tech race

[Daniel Nenni]

Pat Gelsinger warned the US risks falling behind without bold, state-backed investment in key technologies. ODD ANDERSEN/AFP via Getty Images

• - Intel's ex-CEO backed Donald Trump's plan for a US sovereign wealth fund to boost the tech sector
• - In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, Gelsinger said the fund is key to competing with China.
• - He argued private markets can't provide the long-term capital US tech breakthroughs need.

The US is falling behind in the global tech race, and former Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger said a sovereign wealth fund could be the country's best shot at catching up.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed published Tuesday, Gelsinger endorsed President Donald Trump's proposal to create a US sovereign wealth fund, calling it "the country's best tool" to secure American leadership in critical technologies like semiconductors, artificial intelligence, and quantum computing.

"Washington's haphazard approach to fueling national competitiveness and strategic industries isn't cutting it," he wrote. "Trump's proposed sovereign wealth fund could secure American leadership."

Gelsinger, now a general partner at Playground Global, argued that while American companies are making "significant breakthroughs," scaling those technologies needs "patient, long-term capital typically unavailable from Wall Street or traditional venture funds."

A sovereign wealth fund, he said, could support "early-stage quantum companies, help national laboratories commercialize technologies, and ensure US breakthroughs remain domestically controlled."

In February, Trump signed an executive order directing the Treasury and Commerce departments to develop a sovereign wealth fund plan to promote "fiscal sustainability," reduce the tax burden, and "promote United States economic and strategic leadership internationally." The agencies had until May to deliver recommendations on structure, governance, funding, and investment strategy.

Other nations, including Norway, Singapore, and the UAE, have used sovereign funds to fuel their strategic ambitions and increase global influence.

Gelsinger framed a US version of the fund as a strategic response to China's vast state-backed tech investment.

"American firms have to grapple with difficult market distortions thanks to Chinese state investment," he wrote, pointing to Beijing's National Venture Capital Guidance Fund, which he said channels "tens of billions of dollars of central, provincial, and private capital into key technologies."

He rebutted concerns that such a fund amounts to industrial policy, writing: "This isn't an attempt to surmount market forces. It's about the innovative startups already accessing global sovereign-wealth funds like China's, which may not be aligned with American interests."

Not so simple, experts say​

Replicating successful models like Norway's is easier said than done.

Nicolai Tangen, CEO of Norway's $1.7 trillion fund — the largest in the world — said that what works in Oslo may not translate easily to Washington.

Nicolai Tangen is chief executive of Norway's $1.7 trillion sovereign wealth fund. Norsk Telegrambyra AS/Reuters

"You need to allocate capital to it, right?" he told Yahoo Finance's "Opening Bid Unfiltered" earlier this month.

"What has worked for us in Norway is to have a very long-term view on what we do. It has broad political anchoring."

Tangen said that the fund's stability comes from strict rules and transparency. "We are the most transparent fund in the world," he said, adding that "when you have a change in parliament or in government, you do not change the way we invest."

Critics have also said that, unlike Norway, the US doesn't run a budget surplus — it runs multi-trillion-dollar deficits.

While Trump's executive order references $5.7 trillion in federal assets, monetizing those assets would require political consensus and complex legal maneuvering.

Still, Gelsinger believes the stakes are too high to delay. "America needs this fund now more than ever," he wrote.

The White House didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

Ex-Intel CEO backs Trump's sovereign wealth fund plan — and says it can help the US keep up with China in the tech race

Pat Gelsinger, former Intel CEO, advocated for Trump's sovereign wealth fund, calling it crucial for US tech leadership against China.

www.businessinsider.com

 

[Barnsley]

Now advocating Govt Spending?

Its hard to keep up

 

[benb]

Government directed deep pool of capital is one of China's super powers. The US can match it or cede to China. Calling it a sovereign wealth fund doesn't seem accurate (in the US or China case). Both are debtor nations. But The Big Fund is why China has 30% of the semiconductor market now; the US could have done that too.

On 7/16/25, the DoD purchased $400MM in MP Materials new preferred stock.

Apple will invest $500MM.

So it's starting.

https://www.fastcompany.com/91368251/mp-materials-stock-price-today-apple-news

 

[siliconbruh999]

Government directed deep pool of capital is one of China's super powers. The US can match it or cede to China. Calling it a sovereign wealth fund doesn't seem accurate (in the US or China case). Both are debtor nations. But The Big Fund is why China has 30% of the semiconductor market now; the US could have done that too.

On 7/16/25, the DoD purchased $400MM in MP Materials new preferred stock.

Apple will invest $500MM.

So it's starting.

https://www.fastcompany.com/91368251/mp-materials-stock-price-today-apple-news

It's not Apple's Investment tbh that's just marketing it's the entire ecosystem investment Apple doesn't do any manufacturing

 

[hist78]

Pat Gelsinger warned the US risks falling behind without bold, state-backed investment in key technologies. ODD ANDERSEN/AFP via Getty Images

• - Intel's ex-CEO backed Donald Trump's plan for a US sovereign wealth fund to boost the tech sector
• - In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, Gelsinger said the fund is key to competing with China.
• - He argued private markets can't provide the long-term capital US tech breakthroughs need.

The US is falling behind in the global tech race, and former Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger said a sovereign wealth fund could be the country's best shot at catching up.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed published Tuesday, Gelsinger endorsed President Donald Trump's proposal to create a US sovereign wealth fund, calling it "the country's best tool" to secure American leadership in critical technologies like semiconductors, artificial intelligence, and quantum computing.

"Washington's haphazard approach to fueling national competitiveness and strategic industries isn't cutting it," he wrote. "Trump's proposed sovereign wealth fund could secure American leadership."

Gelsinger, now a general partner at Playground Global, argued that while American companies are making "significant breakthroughs," scaling those technologies needs "patient, long-term capital typically unavailable from Wall Street or traditional venture funds."

A sovereign wealth fund, he said, could support "early-stage quantum companies, help national laboratories commercialize technologies, and ensure US breakthroughs remain domestically controlled."

In February, Trump signed an executive order directing the Treasury and Commerce departments to develop a sovereign wealth fund plan to promote "fiscal sustainability," reduce the tax burden, and "promote United States economic and strategic leadership internationally." The agencies had until May to deliver recommendations on structure, governance, funding, and investment strategy.

Other nations, including Norway, Singapore, and the UAE, have used sovereign funds to fuel their strategic ambitions and increase global influence.

Gelsinger framed a US version of the fund as a strategic response to China's vast state-backed tech investment.

"American firms have to grapple with difficult market distortions thanks to Chinese state investment," he wrote, pointing to Beijing's National Venture Capital Guidance Fund, which he said channels "tens of billions of dollars of central, provincial, and private capital into key technologies."

He rebutted concerns that such a fund amounts to industrial policy, writing: "This isn't an attempt to surmount market forces. It's about the innovative startups already accessing global sovereign-wealth funds like China's, which may not be aligned with American interests."

Not so simple, experts say​

Replicating successful models like Norway's is easier said than done.

Nicolai Tangen, CEO of Norway's $1.7 trillion fund — the largest in the world — said that what works in Oslo may not translate easily to Washington.

Nicolai Tangen is chief executive of Norway's $1.7 trillion sovereign wealth fund. Norsk Telegrambyra AS/Reuters

"You need to allocate capital to it, right?" he told Yahoo Finance's "Opening Bid Unfiltered" earlier this month.

"What has worked for us in Norway is to have a very long-term view on what we do. It has broad political anchoring."

Tangen said that the fund's stability comes from strict rules and transparency. "We are the most transparent fund in the world," he said, adding that "when you have a change in parliament or in government, you do not change the way we invest."

Critics have also said that, unlike Norway, the US doesn't run a budget surplus — it runs multi-trillion-dollar deficits.

While Trump's executive order references $5.7 trillion in federal assets, monetizing those assets would require political consensus and complex legal maneuvering.

Still, Gelsinger believes the stakes are too high to delay. "America needs this fund now more than ever," he wrote.

The White House didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

Ex-Intel CEO backs Trump's sovereign wealth fund plan — and says it can help the US keep up with China in the tech race

Pat Gelsinger, former Intel CEO, advocated for Trump's sovereign wealth fund, calling it crucial for US tech leadership against China.

www.businessinsider.com

Does Pat Gelsinger really know what he is talking about?

 

[Daniel Nenni]

Does Pat Gelsinger really know what he is talking about?

Here is the problem, sometimes he does and sometimes he does not, but with his conviction you will not know the difference.

 

[dkr1986]

How is this different from Taiwan government investments in TSMC? TSMC still to this day get preferential treatment from Taiwanese government on many things. Its Taiwan;s decades of industrial policy that created the semiconductor ecosystem in Taiwan. To compete with that US companies does need government support especially considering China's state backed industries disrupting US tech (BYD vs Tesla). Just because Pat Gelsinger said it does not mean it is a bad idea. I witnessed the same when he argued for AI safety. Hate for Pat is too strong in this forum for some reason!

Also not having this one sovereign fund is not going to make any difference in US government spending or US debt situation.

 

[blueone]

Does Pat Gelsinger really know what he is talking about?

No. Pat's communication style is like a network without ECC and no flow control. BTW, that is exactly how Ethernet works in the IEEE 802.3 specifications, which is why the networking world keeps inventing work-arounds, like Data Center Ethernet and Ultra Ethernet. But apparently no matter how many times Pat transmits nonsense there are never any work-arounds forthcoming.

 

[blueone]

How is this different from Taiwan government investments in TSMC? TSMC still to this day get preferential treatment from Taiwanese government on many things. Its Taiwan;s decades of industrial policy that created the semiconductor ecosystem in Taiwan. To compete with that US companies does need government support especially considering China's state backed industries disrupting US tech (BYD vs Tesla). Just because Pat Gelsinger said it does not mean it is a bad idea. I witnessed the same when he argued for AI safety. Hate for Pat is too strong in this forum for some reason!

Also not having this one sovereign fund is not going to make any difference in US government spending or US debt situation.

IMO, the US is not similar to Taiwan in any way. The US government has directly supported various industries in the past, like land grants to the railroads in the 1800s, but railroads are simple to understand compared to semiconductor fabrication. The USG can't even seem to manage its co-dependence relationships with defense contractors. For example, senior civilian leadership fails to understand that episodic urgent contracts for hyper-complex weapons systems, which require highly skilled employees who can qualify for top secret clearance, can't be kicked off quickly. And Congress is too worried about which states the jobs are created in to solve anything, apparently.

The three areas US governments can help happen financially or to expedite things (which already happens big-time at the state and local level for taxes for pretty much any factories), are taxes, permitting, and subsidies. The CHIPS Act is at least a start for subsidies, and the US Supreme Court limiting NEPA so litigation can't tie up federally funded projects, but overall we suck at federal-level industrial policy. Yes, Taiwan and the Chinese are far better at it. The US and Europe are pathetic. The US only seems to get its strategic act together is when it's under dire threat, and I don't see any evidence that Trump or Congress takes chip fabrication that seriously yet.

Pat's notion is just parroting Trump's nonsense on the topic. And Trump is the guy pushing Apple to manufacture iPhones in the US. Talk about not understanding a problem before barfing out nonsense.

 

[dkr1986]

The US only seems to get its strategic act together is when it's under dire threat, and I don't see any evidence that Trump or Congress takes chip fabrication that seriously yet.

Isn't this the reason to have sovereign fund investing in key technologies domestically before it becomes a dire situation (as is the case of semiconductor manufacturing now)?

Pat's notion is just parroting Trump's nonsense on the topic. And Trump is the guy pushing Apple to manufacture iPhones in the US. Talk about not understanding a problem before barfing out nonsense.

I don't understand how you come to this conclusion reading what I read in above. Pat in his opinion piece is talking about the following stuff, and you are combining that to Trump & co advocating for iPhone assembly in USA! His main point to me is the fact that a sovereign fund does not prioritize short term profit similar to a venture capital or stock market on these key initiatives and will have long time horizon rather than focusing on YoY/QoQ growth metrics.

Also, I don't believe congress is going to run this fund if it becomes a reality (they will have influence for sure). Even Norway's model is not managed that way iirc.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed published Tuesday, Gelsinger endorsed President Donald Trump's proposal to create a US sovereign wealth fund, calling it "the country's best tool" to secure American leadership in critical technologies like semiconductors, artificial intelligence, and quantum computing.

"Washington's haphazard approach to fueling national competitiveness and strategic industries isn't cutting it," he wrote. "Trump's proposed sovereign wealth fund could secure American leadership."

Gelsinger, now a general partner at Playground Global, argued that while American companies are making "significant breakthroughs," scaling those technologies needs "patient, long-term capital typically unavailable from Wall Street or traditional venture funds."

A sovereign wealth fund, he said, could support "early-stage quantum companies, help national laboratories commercialize technologies, and ensure US breakthroughs remain domestically controlled."

In February, Trump signed an executive order directing the Treasury and Commerce departments to develop a sovereign wealth fund plan to promote "fiscal sustainability," reduce the tax burden, and "promote United States economic and strategic leadership internationally." The agencies had until May to deliver recommendations on structure, governance, funding, and investment strategy.

Other nations, including Norway, Singapore, and the UAE, have used sovereign funds to fuel their strategic ambitions and increase global influence.

Gelsinger framed a US version of the fund as a strategic response to China's vast state-backed tech investment.

"American firms have to grapple with difficult market distortions thanks to Chinese state investment," he wrote, pointing to Beijing's National Venture Capital Guidance Fund, which he said channels "tens of billions of dollars of central, provincial, and private capital into key technologies."

He rebutted concerns that such a fund amounts to industrial policy, writing: "This isn't an attempt to surmount market forces. It's about the innovative startups already accessing global sovereign-wealth funds like China's, which may not be aligned with American interests."

 

[hist78]

How is this different from Taiwan government investments in TSMC? TSMC still to this day get preferential treatment from Taiwanese government on many things. Its Taiwan;s decades of industrial policy that created the semiconductor ecosystem in Taiwan. To compete with that US companies does need government support especially considering China's state backed industries disrupting US tech (BYD vs Tesla). Just because Pat Gelsinger said it does not mean it is a bad idea. I witnessed the same when he argued for AI safety. Hate for Pat is too strong in this forum for some reason!

Also not having this one sovereign fund is not going to make any difference in US government spending or US debt situation.

Many governments and companies around the world have tried to copy the success of TSMC and Taiwan (ROC) in the semiconductor industry. But strangely, they often follow China’s (PRC) model instead of learning from what TSMC and Taiwan actually did. This is one reason why we haven’t seen another success story like TSMC or Taiwan.

Pat Gelsinger is one example. He misunderstands this and led Intel down the wrong path.

From what I’ve seen, TSMC and Taiwan followed free market principles more than government intervention. The government did play a role, but it was limited, especially when it came to providing founding capital. This could be an interesting topic to explore in a separate thread.

 

[blueone]

Isn't this the reason to have sovereign fund investing in key technologies domestically before it becomes a dire situation (as is the case of semiconductor manufacturing now)?

A sovereign fund is just, in my mind and lots of other people, the wrong way for the US to go about technology investments.

I don't understand how you come to this conclusion reading what I read in above. Pat in his opinion piece is talking about the following stuff, and you are combining that to Trump & co advocating for iPhone assembly in USA! His main point to me is the fact that a sovereign fund does not prioritize short term profit similar to a venture capital or stock market on these key initiatives and will have long time horizon rather than focusing on YoY/QoQ growth metrics.

Trump and his administration were the source of the US wealth fund notion. It's not that I disagree with USG support for critical technologies, it is the proposed implementation. In retrospect, I agree with many of Trump's high-level objectives, but I can only think of one case where I've agreed with his implementation, and even in that case its only a subset of his implementation. As for the wealth fund not prioritizing short term profit, we don't know that. The fund has to be defined by a law passed by Congress, with a governance structure defined by Congress, and it's impossible to judge what Congress will define until we see the result.

Also, I don't believe congress is going to run this fund if it becomes a reality (they will have influence for sure). Even Norway's model is not managed that way iirc.

Congress would not "run" the fund. Congress would define a governance structure, like the Federal Reserve Board and its subordinate banks, and we don't know how it will be managed or what the statutory powers of the governance board will be until Congress acts, or who Congress would approve to be on the board. In the case of the closest example of a wealth fund, The Social Security Trust Fund, multiple iterations of the US Congress over the decades has not been good stewards or protectors of that fund, so I'm not hopeful. I'm more a fan of a market economy and supportive permitting and tax laws.

 

[sonchoy]

Pat is on the money here. TSMC's largest shareholder still is the Taiwanese Government. And that's now - after TSMC has been wildly successful for close to a decade. TSMC was founded with Taiwanese government providing capital back in the 1980s.

The later the US funds the frontier technologies, the higher the price tag will be. Wall Street is looking to make a quick buck - not the institution you'd be looking for patient capital.

I often like to quote Churchill in this forum - "Americans will always do the right thing, after they've tried out everything else."

 

[blueone]

I often like to quote Churchill in this forum - "Americans will always do the right thing, after they've tried out everything else."

I like to quote Churchill too. The man had a special way with words. But I disagree with this particular quote. My version: "The US will likely only do what's difficult and necessary when its leaders perceive the country is on the precipice of disaster."

 

[hist78]

Pat is on the money here. TSMC's largest shareholder still is the Taiwanese Government. And that's now - after TSMC has been wildly successful for close to a decade. TSMC was founded with Taiwanese government providing capital back in the 1980s.

View attachment 3372

The later the US funds the frontier technologies, the higher the price tag will be. Wall Street is looking to make a quick buck - not the institution you'd be looking for patient capital.

I often like to quote Churchill in this forum - "Americans will always do the right thing, after they've tried out everything else."

When TSMC was founded in 1987, its initial capital was US$145 million. The Taiwanese government’s National Development Fund held 48.3%, Philips held 27.6%, and the remaining shares were divided among smaller investors, each holding between 1% and 5%.

Does that mean the Taiwan government’s initial investment was the “secret sauce” behind TSMC’s success, and something worth copying in 2025? The answer is no.

It’s easy to credit TSMC’s success to government funding. But if that alone was the key, why hasn’t the world seen another “TSMC” in the 38 years since? Especially considering that Taiwan is a small island and was relatively poor country at the time.

It’s like assuming that wearing the same clothes, watches, or driving the same cars as billionaires will somehow make me a billionaire too.

Look at the CHIPS Act. It was proposed during the first Trump Administration, passed and funded under Biden, and then effectively killed by Trump himself less than two months into his second term. Do we really believe that a lack of government money is what’s preventing the US from building a semiconductor company as strong as TSMC?