So, now they get shipped back and forth across the Pacific…twice? Wow. So much “winning”.
FYI, this is an AI specific chip. US manufacturing still has supply issues with low tech, cheap chips .
FYI, about half of Nvidia cards are assembled in China. The PCB, cooling, capacitors and voltage regulators are made in China, regardless of assembly location.
Most of these components could easily be made elsewhere, albeit at a higher cost.
back when i was doing research for the DoD, we would order the PCBs we designed from an authorized US supplier, and we would assemble them with our reflow oven, cuz China was a no-no. Also, PCB assembly is so automated that probably labor cost isn’t important anymore, but the supply chain benefits of Shenzhen still win from the logistics perspective
Assembly is relatively straightforward, but sourcing all the components locally is likely getting harder and harder. Granted, for DoD contract reasons there’s likely a cottage industry that relies on government rules to keep things onshore. That’s part of the reason why we still have some made in the USA clothing.
This is worth a listen or a watch if you’re interested.
There’s a huge difference between making a PCB and a modern processor.
Driving up the cost
lol. Good luck trying to train American workers to build such microchips. It’s not gonna happen. They won’t work 24 hour a day.
The US produces a lot of chips, they just aren’t the consumer market leader. The US also prototypes the revolutionary new processes, i.e. 65nm-> 20nm -> …-> 5nm -> 3nm processes all started in the US. But once the process has been proofed, and it’s time for volume they send it to Israel or Taiwan to be mass produced because it’s cheaper and for no other reason.
