Every two weeks, charter flights carrying 300 Taiwanese engineers and their families have been touching down at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.
These aren’t routine business trips.
They’re emergency knowledge transfers.
America invented the semiconductor integrated circuit.
But for decades, America shipped its semiconductor expertise overseas.
We taught the world how to make the chips that power everything from smartphones to fighter jets, then we handed over the factories, the talent, and the technological crown jewels.
Now the bill has come due, and we’re scrambling to get our expertise back before it’s too late.
Yesterday’s Commerce Department restriction on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company’s (TSM) Chinese operations is more than trade policy.
The Trump Administration’s latest move is further evidence of a desperate race to secure American technological survival before China makes our dependence on TSM’s chip choke point irrelevant by force.
The Expertise Exodus
The charter flights cue us into what’s going on.
TSM’s $165 billion Arizona fabrication facility can’t find enough qualified American workers to operate cutting-edge semiconductor manufacturing equipment.
We literally don’t have the people.
The fundamental reality is that America basically gave away the institutional knowledge required to manufacture the most advanced semiconductor technology on earth.
When TSM breaks ground on additional Arizona facilities, charter flights follow. Not because Taiwanese workers are cheaper, but because they’re the only ones who know how to do the job.
The knowledge gap represents decades of strategic negligence. While American companies focused on chip design and marketing, the manufacturing expertise migrated to Taiwan, South Korea, and eventually China.
We have NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA) CEO Jensen Huang flying to Taipei to personally thank TSM’s operations team for manufacturing Nvidia’s next-generation AI architecture.
Think about it: the CEO of America’s most valuable technology company depends entirely on facilities located only 100 miles from mainland China.
It’s a huge risk.
The Taiwan Risk
Taiwan’s semiconductor dominance creates a huge global vulnerability.
The island produces over 90% of the world’s most advanced chips, concentrated in facilities that could be disrupted by military action or blockade.
If China moves against Taiwan, global technology supply chains would face an immediate crisis.
Imagine what would happen to American AI development– it would halt without advanced chips.
Also worrisome: US defense systems dependent on cutting-edge processors would face critical shortages.
The risk grows with every Chinese military exercise in the Taiwan Strait and every escalation in cross-strait tensions.
Trump’s equipment restrictions on TSM’s Chinese facility serve a dual purpose. They prevent China from building alternative manufacturing capabilities, while creating incentives for critical production to migrate to American soil.
But the restrictions also highlight how little time remains. Every month of delay increases the risk that China moves first.
The Knowledge Race
The Taiwanese engineers flying to Arizona carry irreplaceable expertise inside of their heads.
Advanced semiconductor manufacturing is fiendishly difficult. New chips are the most intricate and complex artifacts humans have ever fashioned.
Chip making is more than equipment – it’s about people understanding the thousands of variables that determine whether a fabrication process succeeds or fails.
Chip fab temperature variations are measured in fractions of degrees. Chemical compositions get adjusted by parts per million. Equipment calibrations are made that require years of experience to master.
This knowledge can’t be downloaded or learned from textbooks. It exists in the minds of a relatively small number of people globally, most of whom work for companies based in Taiwan.
America is racing to transfer enough of that knowledge to domestic facilities before geopolitical events make the transfer impossible.
is that from yet another rando on the internet? a plane load every 2 weeks from a country of 20+million is a drop in the ocean, then cuz its probably a randos story there might be by chance an engineer or 2 on said flights.
also they do still operate lithography machines in usa so they still have plenty of talent and knowledge there plus the netherlands does plenty of production.
the bullshit meter on this story has the needle wound around to very stinky.
Ya missed this bit.
The island produces over 90% of the world’s most advanced chips,
Not something you knock up down the farm in a tin shed.
still dosent change the fact its a rando internet story.
“taiwan’s TSMC is expanding its presence in the U.S., particularly with its Arizona facility, which has led to a significant number of Taiwanese chip engineers moving to the U.S. to work there.”
pretty sure it dosent take endless plane loads to fill those roles. just exaggerated internet bullshit facebook losers would lap it up as the super dooper truth.
Just goes to prove how fucking ignorant of things you really are.
Ya don’t spend this kinda money without knowing what you are doing.
TSMC’s planned investment in its Arizona site totals $65 billion for three fabs, a figure that has grown significantly from its initial $12 billion plan for a single factory. The project’s increased cost reflects ambitious expansions, with TSMC recently announcing an additional $100 billion in total US chip manufacturing investments, bringing the overall figure to $165 billion.
It has increased even more to 5 FABs and $160+ billion.
Bit bigger than your local knock shop.
OK, I read it and I was asking what is a semi-conductor?
DDG says ‘A semiconductor is a material that has electrical conductivity between that of a conductor and an insulator. Its conductivity can be modified by adding impurities, a process known as doping, which allows it to be used in various electronic devices like transistors and diodes.’
Yep, clear as mud. Add in a few more words I would need to look up, and bla,bla bla – computer innards.
I’m going to continue picturing a short musical director – but from Taiwan they would all be short anyway…
You’re not alone. As a poorly educated retired cocky I sit between being too intelligent to believe in a Skydaddy & too dumb to understand how semiconductors & chips work.
It’s a comfortable zone to inhabit. 🙂
Why do you need to understand how they work? All you need to know is that they do very well. Almost everything you buy for your home now days has some sort of chip.
And your cars, boats, planes, in fact even your pacemakers and the cellphone you use and the thing in your hand right now.
Soon, Musk will have one for the brain of the “too dumb to understand” above.
Whether that will help or not is another thing.
“and the thing in your hand right now.”
I didn’t know it was electronic, just your ordinary floppy
The real threat with this is the infiltration of the CCP amongst the staff shifting to the new facilities in America. I hope the US keep the cameras on them and track the emails and texts relentlessly. The CCP love stealing intellectual property….remember how they hacked all the suppliers when the F35 jets were in production 15-20 years ago?