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Biden Cements TSMC Grant Before Trump Takes Over

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The White House is racing to finish grant agreements for chip manufacturers, but some of its biggest successes might be credited to the Trump administration.The Biden administration said on Friday that it had completed an agreement to award Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company up to $6.6 billion in grants, as federal officials race to put in place their plans to boost U.S. chip manufacturing before the end of President Biden’s term.The administration struck a preliminary agreement in the spring to provide TSMC with the funding, which will support three new factories in Phoenix. The government will give TSMC the money in tranches as the company meets milestones.In a statement, Mr. Biden said that the foreign direct investment in the facilities was the largest for a new factory project in U.S. history, and that the announcement on Friday was “among the most critical milestones yet” in the rollout of his chips program.The agreement “demonstrates how we are ensuring that the progress made to date will continue to unfold in the coming years, benefiting communities all across the country,” Mr. Biden said.The administration is expected to finish more grant awards in the coming weeks. But the projects might come too late for Mr. Biden to receive much credit. Chip factories take years to build, and many of these projects will not break ground — or produce chips — until well into President-elect Donald J. Trump’s term.Mr. Biden’s administration is working to cement its legacy with the grants as part of a $39 billion program to revitalize U.S. technology manufacturing and reduce reliance on foreign nations for critical semiconductors. The program is a pillar of the president’s economic policy, which has largely focused on bolstering American manufacturing.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    House Committee Targets Chip Technology Firms for China Ties

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    It requested information from a handful of firms that make chip manufacturing possible about their commercial ties to China.A number of technology companies that make semiconductor manufacturing possible are coming under scrutiny from Capitol Hill, as the United States weighs further export restrictions to try to hold back China’s technological advancement.The House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, which has targeted numerous U.S. companies for their ties to China, sent letters on Thursday to a handful of firms making semiconductor manufacturing equipment, expressing concern about technology sales to China and requesting detailed information about the companies’ sales volumes and top customers.The committee said the information would help it better understand how much chip-making technology was flowing to China, and the role that was helping to build out China’s chip manufacturing base.The letters were sent to three U.S.-based companies that make semiconductor manufacturing equipment — Applied Materials, Lam Research and KLA — as well as the Japanese firm Tokyo Electron and the Dutch equipment maker ASML.These five firms dominate the global market for semiconductor manufacturing equipment, some of the world’s most sophisticated technology, which allows chip makers to fabricate semiconductors with features just a few atoms wide.The letters were signed by Representatives John Moolenaar, the Michigan Republican who heads the committee, and Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois, the Democratic ranking member.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    in Economy

    New York State Chosen as National Center for Chip Manufacturing Research

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    The Biden administration will place a hub of a newly created national semiconductor technology center in upstate New York.The Biden administration is set to announce on Thursday that it will invest an estimated $825 million in a new federally funded semiconductor research facility in upstate New York.The decision to locate the facility in Albany comes after a long-running push by Senator Chuck Schumer, the majority leader and a Democrat of New York, to base it in his home state.Albany will serve as one major hub of a bigger organization, the National Semiconductor Technology Center, which will focus on computer chip research and development, Mr. Schumer’s office said. The center is a key part of the Biden administration’s efforts to revitalize American high-tech manufacturing and lessen the country’s dependence on foreign sources of technology.The New York site will focus on research into the complex machinery that is necessary to manufacture chips. The locations of the other two hubs, which will focus on how chips are designed and packaged together, will be announced later.Mr. Schumer said in an interview on Wednesday that the New York investment would produce research that benefited the country, cement U.S. leadership in advanced chip technology over China and provide a major source of manufacturing employment for the area.“This is historic,” he said. “It’s going to keep our country, our national security and our economic security way ahead.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    How SMIC, China’s Semiconductor Champion, Landed in the Heart of a Tech War

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    Efforts by the Beijing-backed Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation, or SMIC, to break through innovation barriers have landed it in a geopolitical tech battle.In a sprawling factory in eastern Shanghai, where marshy plains have long since been converted into industrial parks, China’s most advanced chipmaker has been hard at work testing the limits of U.S. authority.Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation, or SMIC, is manufacturing chips with features less than one-15,000th of the thickness of a sheet of paper. The chips pack together enough computing power to create advancements like artificial intelligence and 5G networks.It’s a feat that has been achieved by just a few companies globally — and one that has landed SMIC in the middle of a crucial geopolitical rivalry. U.S. officials say such advanced chip technology is central not just to commercial businesses but also to military superiority. They have been fighting to keep it out of Chinese hands, by barring China from buying both the world’s most cutting-edge chips and the machinery to make them.Whether China can advance and outrace the United States technologically now hinges on SMIC, a partly state-backed company that is the sole maker of advanced chips in the country and has become its de facto national semiconductor champion. SMIC pumps out millions of chips a month for other companies that design them, such as Huawei, the Chinese technology firm under U.S. sanctions, as well as American firms like Qualcomm.So far, SMIC hasn’t been able to produce chips as advanced as those of rivals such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company in Taiwan, or others in South Korea and the United States. But it is racing forward with a new A.I. chip for Huawei called the Ascend 910C, which is expected to be released this year.Huawei’s chip is not as fast or sophisticated as the coveted processors from Nvidia, the U.S. chip giant, which the White House has banned for sale in China. SMIC can also most likely make only a small fraction of what Chinese firms want to buy, experts said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Japan Tries to Reclaim Its Clout as a Global Tech Leader

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    Japanese chip companies are tapping billions of dollars and collaborating with foreign firms as part of new government policies that look outward.China’s envy-inducing success in using industrial policy to expand its economy and finance green manufacturing has helped kick off a fevered scrimmage among nations to develop and protect their own hometown businesses.It has been 40 years since such competitive anxieties about a rising Asian power prompted this kind of embrace of government intervention among the biggest free-market economies.Only then it was Japan, not China, that was the source of unease.Michael Crichton’s 1992 thriller, “Rising Sun,” with its dark depiction of Japan’s ruthless economic warriors, ruled the best-seller lists, alongside nonfiction titles that warned of the financial and technology juggernaut created by Japan’s powerful government trade ministry.In a 1990 survey, nearly two-thirds of Americans said Japanese investment in the United States posed a threat to American economic independence.It turned out that the anxiety about Japan Inc. peaked just as the country began a long economic slide after the collapse of real estate and stock market bubbles.Now, after a period of stagnation that Japan’s economy ministry refers to as “the lost three decades,” Tokyo is engaged in a multibillion-dollar industrial policy to jump-start the lackluster economy and recapture its position as a tech innovator.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • 113 Shares199 Views

    in Economy

    U.S. Tightens Technology Controls to Target Russian War Machine

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    The Biden administration announced new penalties on shell companies and suppliers that were feeding Russia’s war against Ukraine.The Biden administration said on Friday that it would add more than 100 companies and organizations in Russia, China and several other countries to a restricted trade list and take other measures, as it widens its net to try to capture more advanced technology that is flowing to the Russian military.The new rules aim to disrupt the procurement networks that are funneling semiconductors and other technology to Russian forces, who then use them to wage war against Ukraine. They will give the U.S. government expanded authority to prevent products made with U.S. technology from being shipped to Russia, even if those products are manufactured in countries outside of the United States.The penalties also included the addition of 123 entities in Russia, Crimea, China, Turkey, Iran and Cyprus to a so-called entity list. Suppliers are barred from sending companies on the entity list certain products without first obtaining a government license.The government also added certain addresses in Hong Kong and Turkey to the list that were known to set up shell companies, meaning any further shell companies registered to those addresses would face trade restrictions.The entity list additions include several uncovered in a recent investigation by The New York Times, including an office at 135 Bonham Strand in Hong Kong’s financial district that specialized in setting up shell companies. The office was the place of registration for at least four companies that funneled millions of restricted chips and sensors to military technology companies in Russia, the investigation found.The additions bring the number of organizations that the Biden administration has added to the entity list in relation to Russia’s war in Ukraine to more than 1,000.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    in Economy

    U.S. Vies With Allies and Industry to Tighten China Tech Controls

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    The Biden administration must navigate the interests of U.S. companies and allied governments as it tries to close off China’s access to advanced chipsThe Biden administration is fighting to overcome opposition from allied nations and the tech industry as it prepares to expand restrictions aimed at slowing China’s ability to make the most advanced semiconductors, which could be used to bolster Beijing’s military capacity.The administration has drafted new rules that would limit shipments to China of the machinery and software used to make chips from a number of countries if they are made with American parts or technology, as well as some types of semiconductors, according to people who have seen or were briefed on a draft version of the rules.The rules are aimed at blocking off some of the newer routes that Chinese chipmakers have found to acquire technology, despite international restrictions.The United States has been pushing allies like Japan and the Netherlands to toughen their restrictions on technology shipments to China, during visits to those countries as well as a Japanese state visit to Washington in April. Those nations are home to companies that produce chip-making machinery, like ASML Holding N.V. and Tokyo Electron Limited. But industry in the United States and other countries has argued the rules could hurt them, and it remains unclear when or if foreign governments will issue limitations.In the meantime, some of the rules that the United States plans to impose would have significant carve-outs, the people said. The rules blocking shipments of equipment to certain semiconductor factories in China would not apply to more than 30 allied countries, including the Netherlands, South Korea and Japan.That has sparked pushback from U.S. firms, who argue that the playing field will be further tilted against them if the U.S. government stops their sales but not those of their competitors.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    World’s Five Leading Chipmakers Have Now Promised U.S. Investment

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    The announcement of CHIPS Act funding for a plant in Indiana means the United States will have attracted investment from the world’s top chipmakers.The Biden administration said on Tuesday that it would award up to $450 million in grants to a South Korean chipmaker, SK Hynix, to help build its new chip facility in Indiana, in what officials described as a milestone in rebuilding the U.S. semiconductor manufacturing industry.With the announcement, the United States now has commitments from all five of the world’s leading-edge semiconductor manufacturers to construct chip plants in the United States with financial assistance from the administration, Commerce Secretary Gina M. Raimondo said in a call with reporters on Monday. The Biden administration previously announced that it had reached agreements with Intel, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Samsung and Micron to help fund investments in the United States.“These are the only companies in the world capable of producing leading-edge chips at scale,” she said.SK Hynix announced in April that it had committed to investing $3.87 billion in a facility in West Lafayette, Ind. Ms. Raimondo called that investment a “huge deal” because it meant that the United States would “have the most secure and diverse supply chain in the world for the advanced semiconductors that power artificial intelligence.” SK Hynix makes advanced memory chips that are an essential component for creating A.I.Commerce Department officials said that, with the SK Hynix grant, the United States had now allocated more than $30 billion of a $39 billion pot of funding that stems from the CHIPS Act, a bipartisan law aimed at building up domestic chip manufacturing and reducing America’s dependence on Asia for vital semiconductors.Only about 10 percent of the world’s semiconductors are manufactured in the United States, down from about 37 percent in 1990. Reversing the nation’s declining share of global chip manufacturing has been a major priority for President Biden and a key component of his economic policy agenda.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    in Economy

    U.S. Awards $120 Million to Polar Semiconductor to Expand Chip Facility

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    The grant is the latest federal award in a series stemming from the CHIPS and Science Act meant to ramp up domestic production of vital semiconductors.Federal officials will provide up to $120 million in grants to Polar Semiconductor to help the company expand its chip manufacturing facility in Minnesota, the Biden administration announced on Monday, the latest in a string of awards meant to strengthen the U.S. supply of semiconductors.Commerce Department officials said the grant would help Polar upgrade technology and double production capacity at its facility in Bloomington, Minn., within two years. The company produces chips that are critical for cars, defense systems and electrical grids, federal officials said.“We are making taxpayer dollars go as far as possible while crowding in private and state investment to create jobs, secure our supply chains and bolster manufacturing in Minnesota,” said Laurie Locascio, the under secretary of commerce for standards and technology.The funding stems from the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act, which lawmakers passed in 2022 to ramp up the domestic production of commercial semiconductors, the tiny chips crucial for most electronics, including smartphones, computers, cars and weapons systems. The law gave the Commerce Department $39 billion to distribute to companies to incentivize the construction and expansion of new plants in the United States.Scaling up domestic chip production is a major component of President Biden’s economic policy agenda, which largely focuses on bolstering American manufacturing and bringing back jobs that have shifted overseas. Only about 10 percent of the world’s semiconductors are produced in the United States, down from about 37 percent in 1990.Biden administration officials have so far announced awards of more than $29 billion. Last month, the Commerce Department announced up to $6.1 billion in grants to Micron to help the chipmaker build plants in New York and Idaho. Other chipmakers — including Samsung, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company and Intel — have received multibillion-dollar awards. GlobalFoundries, Microchip Technology and BAE Systems received the first three federal awards.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More