[HN Gopher] Apple announces multibillion deal with Broadcom to m...
___________________________________________________________________
Apple announces multibillion deal with Broadcom to make components
in the USA
Author : ksec
Score : 486 points
Date : 2023-05-23 14:39 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.macrumors.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.macrumors.com)
| vkdelta wrote:
| So, Apple decides to make their own 5G cellular modem. Now, apart
| from Baseband, some of the RF in the cellular is hard (modulators
| with low power consumption, Envelope trackers, diplexers,
| duplexers). Some of these were designed by Qualcomm and some from
| Avago (Broadcom got acquired by Avago and renamed to Broadcom),
| Skyworks, Analog Devices, etc. So it is not surprising that Apple
| wants Broadcom's help for next few years until when Apple decides
| to again vertically integrate and make those components as well (
| but they may decide it is not that cost competitive to do do).
|
| The hardest part was Qualcomm's cost and paying them FOB
| royalties (which got capped at some point by DOJ/FTC
| involvement).
| babl-yc wrote:
| I was interested in seeing the kind of job opportunities this
| would create. Especially after reading Chip War [1] which goes
| into the history of the offshoring and globalization of Fab
| processes.
|
| Here are a few of the openings Broadcom's openings at the Fort
| Collins, CO site [2]:
|
| - Material handler, Manufacturing operator: 12.25 hour shifts,
| 3-4 day work weeks, ~$19-25/hr. Night shift in higher demand
|
| - General Mechanical Technician: $20-37/hr, alarm response a big
| component of role
|
| - ASIC Digital Design Engineer, Fab Quality Engineer, R&D
| Software Engineer, Cleanroom facilities project manager: $78-150k
| + equity, BS/MS + related experience requirements
|
| [1] https://www.amazon.com/Chip-War-Worlds-Critical-
| Technology/d... [2]
| https://broadcom.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/External_Career?locat...
| rayiner wrote:
| That asic digital designer range is really low unless the
| equity is very generous.
| thatoneguy wrote:
| Yeah, I remember meeting someone who designed ASICs back in
| 2000 or 2001 and he made ~$260k/year ($1000/work day) as a
| salaried employee for a certain large printer company.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| These are in Fort Collins, CO. It's the 151st largest metro
| area in the US, so it's not really a tech jobs hub. Getting up
| to $150K plus equity and benefits wouldn't be a great salary in
| San Jose or Seattle, but it's not out of line with a lot of
| tech jobs in less populated metro areas.
| nerdponx wrote:
| Even in New York and Boston there are a lot of programmers
| and other midlevel ICs making making ~$150k. Not everyone is
| lucky enough to work at Google.
| rngname22 wrote:
| I work in New York at a tech company with more than 200
| employees that's a household name among below 50s and
| considered a hot brand and I only get paid 150.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| NYC metro or Rochester/Buffalo? 150k goes a lot further
| in the latter.
| nerdponx wrote:
| Last I checked, $150k/year was enough to afford a decent
| house in a place like Penfield. It's a completely
| different world. I'm talking about NYC metro.
| Interestingly it seems like just about all of New England
| is more expensive than comparable areas in Western NY.
| numbsafari wrote:
| It pays to be on the coastal plains, east of the
| Appalachian mountains.
| nsporillo wrote:
| I bought a house in a suburb of Rochester on a $80k
| salary in 2021. Same house 2 years later would be double
| the monthly payment :)
| notyourwork wrote:
| +1 I live in California or I like in Washington is very
| different from I live in San Francisco or I live in
| Seattle.
| nerdponx wrote:
| Basically nobody outside of NY even remembers that
| Rochester exists, I was being lazy but I figured that
| most people would interpret NY == NYC.
| notyourwork wrote:
| NYC, $150k. That's a pretty abysmal salary for a software
| engineer.
| tdeck wrote:
| ASIC design is a much more ratified skill set than you'd
| need for a normal programming job. I always found it sad
| that salaries in the hardware industry are so comparatively
| low.
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| It's even crazier when you consider that readily
| available knowledge for cutting edge hardware is much
| more scarce compared to software. There are no massive
| communities of knowledgeable people all trying to show
| you what you are doing wrong.
|
| Especially for something like silicon design, there is
| virtually zero knowledge available outside of
| institutions.
| DontchaKnowit wrote:
| I think in some ways this actually is better though. I
| find that when I want technical info about hardware-
| specific topics, I do not find the same kind of dumpster-
| fire articles like I would about say, ReactJS, or
| something similarly trendy. Its always some basic
| html/css website with extremely well written technical
| information from an old-head that is a master of whatever
| he is talking about.
| johnwalkr wrote:
| I understand what you mean by better but you have to
| admit the much lower compensation is weird given how much
| higher the bar is to be an SME and how many fewer the
| engineers are.
| [deleted]
| 123pie123 wrote:
| I wanted to go into ASIC design a few decades ago, but
| the level of pay was hordendously low compared to IT.
|
| Sounds like nothing has changed
| hadlock wrote:
| Housing in the NE isn't amazing, but it's dramatically
| better than the bay area. You need to make 225+ (300
| realistically) in the bay area to be a home owner, and even
| then you're living in a marginal area with a lot of
| compromises
| Patrol8394 wrote:
| I don't think 225 or even 300 would be enough. Especially
| if you have kids. I don't think people truly realize how
| home ownership has become completely out of reach for
| most, even for tech workers.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I would want minimum two $200k+ incomes in case of income
| loss for one person.
| bla3 wrote:
| In NY at least, you can do into Fintech. That pays _better_
| than Google/Meta.
| [deleted]
| janejeon wrote:
| Genuinely curious - is that now, or back when rates were
| low?
| justsocrateasin wrote:
| per hour salary is usually drastically worse though.
| biztos wrote:
| Second prize is a set of steak knives...
| astrange wrote:
| Now, or doing zero interest rates?
|
| I'm not sure I've ever seen a useful customer fintech
| company, except maybe Betterment if you ignore half the
| features.
| samtho wrote:
| People always crap on tech for being useless while
| ignoring that 95% of fintech companies exist solely and
| completely as a vehicle to generate money for a very
| small group of people.
| astrange wrote:
| I thought they existed to create customer lists for Chase
| to acquire.
| Patrol8394 wrote:
| What makes faang special are rsu refresh, that makes a
| huge difference.
| anthomtb wrote:
| Fort Collins is not near a San Jose or Seattle level of tech
| employment but then, neither is anywhere else in the USA. Any
| tech worker who ends up there won't be hurting for employment
| opportunities, especially if they are willing to commute to
| Denver or Boulder.
|
| Just don't be surprised when the cost-of-living ends up
| higher then one might expect. Housing is still a good deal by
| Bay Area or NYC standards, though.
| revered_ wrote:
| Housing in the corridor from Fort Collins to south of
| Denver is expensive and comparable to bay area pricing.
|
| You will not be able to afford much on 150K there.
| OrvalWintermute wrote:
| That is funny because looking on Redfin I see the exact
| opposite.
|
| 4 Bed, 3 Bath 2k to 3k Square feet houses average $264 a
| square foot, 650k average price.
|
| That is a great deal more affordable than my Zip code or
| most of the good housing areas in the Bay area
|
| https://www.redfin.com/city/7006/CO/Fort-
| Collins/filter/sort...
| Kye wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Collins,_Colorado#Economy
|
| >> _" Many high-tech companies have relocated to Fort Collins
| because of the resources of Colorado State University and its
| research facilities. Hewlett-Packard, Intel, AMD, Broadcom,
| Beckman Coulter, Microsoft, Rubicon Water and Pelco all have
| offices in Fort Collins. Other industries include clean
| energy, bioscience, and agri-tech businesses."_
|
| Maybe not a hub yet, but it's headed that way. It's also only
| an hour away from Denver.
| blackguardx wrote:
| Most of these companies are there because of the HP campus
| set up there in the 70s/80s. HP liked setting up offices in
| small towns near colleges where they were the essentially
| the only tech employer. Broadcom bought HP's fab facilities
| after they divested. Microsoft started an office there
| because they wanted to hire optical mice engineers who were
| working for HP.
|
| Source: Used to work at the Microsoft office in Fort
| Collins (HoloLens group). Some of the folks I worked with
| were the original folks that set up the office.
| meesles wrote:
| People who have been to Fort Collins know that that city
| needs a _lot_ of infrastructure work to become anything
| more than it is now. FC already bulges under the pressure
| of college move-in/out and tourism there is fairly big for
| Coloradans. I also don't think residents are the kinds that
| would go for large expansion. Denver still has more than
| enough room to grow before they push out into the smaller
| towns, and if they did Boulder would go first since it
| already has a startup ecosystem IMO.
| CubsFan1060 wrote:
| It's sadly been moving a bit the other way. HP/HPE have
| significantly downsized and Microsoft's office is pretty
| tiny. I"m not sure AMD even has an office here anymore, if
| so, they took down the sign on the building it used to be
| on.
|
| HP, Broadcom, Intel, and AMD used to all be on the same
| intersection.
| open-paren wrote:
| And Intel just chopped the size of the office in half.
| They don't use the upper floor anymore.
| 93po wrote:
| Median house price is still $590k there, which is $4200 a
| month plus taxes and PMI. $150k is $8800 a month take home
| pay after taxes (including CO state). Making $150k and still
| spending more than half your post-tax income (after
| taxes/PMI/repairs/HOA) on housing is wild.
| cjsawyer wrote:
| I am from Colorado and went to school in Fort Collins. It
| maybe be small nationally, but it's probably the 4th biggest
| tech area in CO after Denver, DTC, and Colorado Springs. Cost
| of living is surprisingly high unless you live in student
| housing.
| DMell wrote:
| For added context.. My partner went to CSU and we moved
| away from FC a little over a year ago. Our rent for a 1BR /
| 1BA was $1,700 a month.
| sounds wrote:
| Keep in mind the posted salary is negotiable. It's a rookie
| mistake to assume that if you are offered the job, your only
| option is to take the offer at the amount listed in the
| public job offer.
|
| Negotiating salary well is an important career skill.
| bluGill wrote:
| Most places I've been at don't have much room to negotiate
| salary. You can often get a better vacation package though
| if you ask.
| cj wrote:
| This might be true at large companies where you're being
| handled by a HR team.
|
| Smaller companies are typically very willing to
| negotiate. It can't hurt to ask for 20% more. The worst
| that will happen is they'll say no.
|
| Asking for more than 20% gets a bit risky.
| encoderer wrote:
| The first time I tried to negotiate (2006) I asked for
| $52k from $50k and they told me no.
|
| The next time (2008), offer was $60k, I countered at
| $100k (job required relocation) and we met at $80k.
|
| The next time (2011), offer was $110k, got $120k (relo
| again, this time to a tech center)
|
| Next time (2012), offer was $125k, got $140k and more
| equity.
|
| I've never had a job offer rescinded over it which was
| always something I heard about growing up.
|
| Of course times change and ymmv.
| throw9away6 wrote:
| Medium/low pay for the work required
| andrei_says_ wrote:
| This statement sounds cynical.
|
| I hate the fact that I agree - feeling cynical myself.
|
| At this point when I read about $megacorp moving production
| to the US, I see an indication of globalization-level
| exploitation and profits being applied to the US labor
| market.
| RandomTisk wrote:
| Those are still quite livable wages, I'm not seeing
| tremendous wealth but I'm not seeing any exploitation
| either. I imagine in fifty years some people will be
| getting paid minimum wage accomplishing basically the same
| output that a masters degree + 250k+ salary is pulling in
| now, it all depends on the technology in the tools.
| ajmurmann wrote:
| > At this point when I read about $megacorp moving
| production to the US, I see an indication of globalization-
| level exploitation and profits being applied to the US
| labor market.
|
| What do you expect or want to happen? Companies will pay
| the lowest price they can to adequately fill the role they
| need to fill. As everything it comes down to demand and
| supply. If lots of folks are available who can fill the
| role well, the comp is gonna be pretty low. Do you want
| companies to pay more just out of charity? When apples are
| on sale, do you ever just pay double the price because it
| feels fairer? The only place where we do this is with tips
| and that's usually already priced in.
| antonjs wrote:
| I've got to admit I was pretty surprised when I learned about
| the pay + hard work setup for semi engineers at TSMC in
| Taiwan. I'd be curious if anyone has any first hand
| experience with it.
| justinclift wrote:
| A (westerner) friend who lived in Taiwan for a few years
| returned recently. He keeps on saying the general lifestyle
| and living conditions in Taiwan are really lousy compared
| to Australia.
|
| eg the climate is so wet/humid in Taiwan that the buildings
| tend to generate mold, most things are run down, and that
| kind of thing.
|
| Didn't sound like a good place to live (yeah, as a
| generalisation), if you've got a choice in the matter.
| senko wrote:
| Pick any two:
|
| - better wages
|
| - US jobs
|
| - lower price
| sounds wrote:
| That may be true for highly labor intensive roles but a fully
| automated operation is _more_ profitable when the few jobs
| that are required are staffed by trained personnel.
|
| That is one of the reasons this factory isn't located in a
| poorer area. It's in Ft. Collins _because_ the profitability
| projections assume they can operate at somewhere better than
| 97% uptime.
| rozap wrote:
| better wages, us jobs. easy.
|
| And don't replace your iPhone every year, because now it
| costs 50% more.
|
| Of course, walking back on the race to the bottom will be
| difficult. So I don't know how it plays out in the real
| world.
| borissk wrote:
| So you think Apple will be fine with their sales falling
| down, because they moved production to US?
| rozap wrote:
| No, I said it won't play out like that given the race to
| the bottom. My comment was from an idealistic pov,
| because the parent comment gave me the opportunity to
| choose two, and those are the two I would choose if I was
| king :)
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _don 't replace your iPhone every year, because now it
| costs 50% more_
|
| This flattens down the experience curve [1], meaning the
| technological edge advances slower. That, in turn, exposes
| the entire industry to more-agile competition. This is the
| recipe for undermining competition behind a protectionist
| wall: cut costs to beat bigger competition with movement
| and then scale.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experience_curve_effects
| skywal_l wrote:
| Doesn't the first and last one cancel each other out?
| fakedang wrote:
| Lower price of the product I presume.
| _the_special_ wrote:
| If you want better wages (relative to the location the
| employees are) and also lower prices of goods, then you
| can't have production in the US
| lstamour wrote:
| I dunno, I think it's actually Pick three:
| - extreme corporate profits - better wages -
| US jobs - lower prices
|
| You can't optimize both for extreme shareholder returns
| and extreme wealth at the top and also pay first world
| good wages/living standards and have lower prices.
| Unfortunately, in this race, shareholder returns is often
| still the last thing compromised on, it seems.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _can't optimize both for extreme shareholder returns
| and extreme wealth at the top and also pay first world
| good wages /living standards and have lower prices_
|
| Ignoring new entrants, sure. In a competitive market,
| shareholder returns entice new entrants. Flatten those
| and you lose that edge.
|
| For many markets, the competition caveat is missing: this
| is something we can improve with policy. But pushing down
| profits for labor's sake is a false economy; it leaves
| the industry less resilient in a global context. Put
| another way, a solid repeatable business plan is finding
| a market leader suppressing shareholder returns and
| exploiting what they're missing from a separate
| jurisdiction.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| That's not actually pick three. It's that if you have
| uncompetitive markets (and therefore high
| rents/inefficiency), you end up with worse wages, loss of
| US jobs _and_ high prices. Because then the price
| companies can charge is no longer tied to their labor
| cost, so they can cut labor costs without lowering
| prices.
|
| This is clearly what's happened and needs fixing, but
| even after that, you still have a trade off between high-
| paying US jobs and low consumer prices.
|
| But the answer to that one isn't as obvious because it
| isn't linear. In a competitive market, competition with
| labor in other countries might cause you to get paid
| $1000/year less, but lower your cost of living by
| $2000/year.
| skywal_l wrote:
| I understand that, but if better wages lead to increase
| costs, it should be a zero sum game in the grand scheme
| of things. But, at least, you are not dependent on China
| for making stuff.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| If you try to argue that the well-being of capitalists and
| the well-being of regular people/workers are one and the
| same you run into contradictions very quickly.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| What other systems are better at promoting regular
| peoples' well-being?
|
| Difficulty: answer without referring to lightly-populated
| and culturally-homogeneous Nordic petrostates.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| > Difficulty: answer without referring to lightly-
| populated and culturally-homogeneous Nordic petrostates.
|
| ... All of which are also running under capitalism.
| astrange wrote:
| The main class of capitalists in the US is regular people
| with 401k accounts. (After that is small business owners,
| who I agree are evil but most people like.)
| avgcorrection wrote:
| Ye cast the stone at Taylor Swift, yet do not comprehend
| that the average musician is Brad with his dusty nylon
| guitar in the attic? (Egg on my face.)
| senko wrote:
| In the US, every worker with a 401(k) is also a
| capitalist.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| How irrelevant. And uncreative (both of you.)
|
| They aren't "job creators".
| nimbius wrote:
| General Mechanical Technician is another name for mechanical
| maintenance. in my experience, if "alarm response" is a big
| part of the gig then run for the hills because this company
| intends to run their equipment until its literally a pile of
| flaming grease and beeping melted plastic.
|
| alarm response means you as a mech tech/mechanical maintenance
| have failed proactive or preventative work and will spend the
| rest of your career working mandatory overtime to fix what aint
| fixable anymore. the reason for this failure is nearly always
| management pushing for higher uptime and output. alarm response
| should _never_ constitute a new factories big ticket issues.
| neximo64 wrote:
| The competition is Taiwan, you realise that?
|
| - Automation can't easily justify higher salaries, as it is
| highly automated to begin with.
|
| - The product's pricing has to be cheap too, which is going to
| be difficult.
| dylan604 wrote:
| >12.25 hour shifts
|
| I've never seen this. Is that a required 15 overlap for shift
| change?
| grecy wrote:
| That is exactly what my buddies do in the Alberta oilsands
| for exactly the overlap reason.
| tomassre wrote:
| 12 hour shifts are 13+ hours of actually being there because
| of lunch / breaks. For example Genentech in SF / Vacaville
| are "12 hours paid shifts" with 1 hour mandatory lunch. So no
| it is not required for an overlap because there i already a
| required by law break (lunch) that forces overlap (assuming
| this applies to more states than just CA).
| dylan604 wrote:
| This is the way it was handled when I worked in a place
| that had 3 8 hour shifts. You actually were there 8.5 hours
| with a 30 minute lunch, so this additional .25 hours just
| seemed odd that it was necessary.
| Aromasin wrote:
| Interesting to hear this, following all the articles that they
| would ditch Broadcom not to long ago (one article of many from
| the start of the year):
| https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/gadgets-news/after-intel...)
| diebeforei485 wrote:
| Apple is basically building redundancy into its supply chain
| here. Just in case they are cut off from China, they will be able
| to set up final assembly elsewhere and will already have supply
| of the critical parts.
| WhyNotHugo wrote:
| With Biden repeatedly threatening to invade China and destroy
| the factories in Taiwan, it's clear Apple is just making sure
| they have a good fallback plan.
| bearjaws wrote:
| > With Biden repeatedly threatening to invade China
|
| Has he actually said invade China?
|
| The most the US has said was when China invades Taiwan, the
| US will defend them.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Has he actually said invade China?_
|
| No. Even with moronically-generous parsing, where Taiwan is
| considered part of China, there is no U.S. policy of
| invading Taiwan.
| hackerlight wrote:
| You have to parse through the rhetorical dishonesty to
| understand the meaning. In the mind of the radicalized
| Chinese nationalist, Taiwan _is_ China (remember, they do
| not give a damn what the people inside Taiwan actually
| want, those people don 't matter), so if Biden says that he
| will defend Taiwan if it gets invaded, that is equivalent
| in the mind of the nationalist to Biden saying he'll invade
| China.
| pertymcpert wrote:
| It's not an invasion of the country being invaded asks for
| help.
| yalogin wrote:
| Oof that was out of left field. Did not expect this here.
| Obviously wrong
| barbazoo wrote:
| Citation needed
| pkaye wrote:
| Mexico is becoming the new China for manufacturing. Even many
| Chinese companies are building factories there. Also recently
| Mexico is offering work visas for workers from central America.
| Check out this Wendover video on it.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXT46osICdY
| ren_engineer wrote:
| they are just using Mexico as a way to get around tariffs and
| other trade restrictions. On paper it might say "Mexico" is
| the biggest trade partner for the US, but the reality all the
| stuff is still coming from China with an extra hop to do
| final assembly in Mexico. China is doing the same thing with
| manufacturing in Vietnam, all the money still flows back to
| China in the end
|
| Mexico has none of the actual infrastructure or skilled
| workforce needed to be an actual manufacturing powerhouse
| that makes things from scratch
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| Wasn't Mexico like that in the '90s? I remember GPUs,
| ThinkPads and a lot of PC hardware were made in Mexico back
| then.
|
| And then suddenly, as if overnight, everything moved to
| China.
| pkaye wrote:
| That is true. But now China is getting expensive and the
| population is getting older fast and the Chinese leadership
| is getting less predicable. Mexico meanwhile is much
| younger and labor cost is lower than China. Its a
| neighboring country and part of a free trade agreement.
| Canada and Mexico now at par with China in their total
| trade with US. The threat of future pandemic and global
| conflicts and their impact on supply chains has made
| companies more cautious. Its of just offshoring, its
| instead onshoring, nearshoring or friendshoring. A lot of
| the stuff onshoring will be higher value or those of
| national security or highly automatable.
|
| https://www.visualcapitalist.com/us-largest-trading-
| partners...
| wmf wrote:
| Yep. https://www.wired.com/2001/11/flex/
| 1970-01-01 wrote:
| Broadcom stock price has been soaring lately. Good time to buy or
| missed the boat?
| 0x457 wrote:
| Buy the rumor, sell the news.
| Destiner wrote:
| Never try to catch a specific price if you don't have any
| private insight, as that is effectively day trading.
| moffkalast wrote:
| Never try it with private insight either, they'll just book
| you for insider trading.
| Signez wrote:
| Does this mean that those iPhone components will be manufactured
| in the US, then shipped overseas to be incorporated into new
| iPhones, which will then be shipped back to the US?
|
| I understand that this makes sense, but at the same time, I
| wonder how many tons of CO2 will be emitted because of this kind
| of "onshoring".
| londons_explore wrote:
| Shipping of tiny electronic components around the globe doesn't
| have any substantial CO2 emissions, as long as they are shipped
| in bulk (and preferably by sea), simply because each component
| is so small/light.
|
| Shipping your bags of clothes when you go on holiday has a
| _far_ bigger impact. Those are shipped by air (~50x the CO2),
| are far larger /heavier, and in a weeks time will be shipped
| back, perhaps unused.
| lnsru wrote:
| Nobody ships high value small expensive components by sea.
| It's ok for reels of generic resistors. But not good for
| project specific parts.
| londons_explore wrote:
| They are normally shipped by sea to distributors.
| darksaints wrote:
| Almost all electronic components are shipped by sea. It is
| only finished goods that have a minuscule but real chance
| of being shipped by air.
| londons_explore wrote:
| And even then, it is normally planned that finished goods
| are shipped by sea, and it is only when things fall
| behind schedule that air shipping is used as a way to get
| goods into the right place in time for release day.
| raverbashing wrote:
| You'd be surprised at what flies in the big cargo
| airlines (Lufthansa Cargo, CargoLux, Atlas Air, etc) and
| who their customers are
| geraldwhen wrote:
| iPhones are shipped by air to Louisville, KY to
| distribute throughout the central USA. It shuts down UPS
| for a whole week when iPhones launch. All employees can
| be required to unload and move iPhones, including
| engineering.
| lnsru wrote:
| The big corp I work for has dedicated logistic dudes who
| fly with crates full of wafers around the world. While 30
| years lifecycle FPGAs from Xilinx feel well in the
| container in open sea, project specific parts
| manufactured for specific client's specific product with
| lifecycle of 2 years go by plane. Saving 1000$ and
| risking loosing business is not worth it.
| mynameisvlad wrote:
| One anecdote does not make a pattern. Just because your
| specific big corp does it does not mean all big corps do,
| let alone companies in general.
| SV_BubbleTime wrote:
| Are you confusing an instance of JIT/lean with possibly
| broader trends?
| wmf wrote:
| Chips already travel around the world. Wafers from US or
| European fabs might go to Singapore or Malaysia for test and
| packaging, then to China.
| lallysingh wrote:
| Fair enough. I wonder if this is a supply-chain security thing
| or a step towards eventually building the phones in the US.
| babypuncher wrote:
| Probably a mix of both. China is a growing liability, and
| there is increasing political pressure to both diversify and
| onshore manufacturing.
|
| The growth in spending on US manufacturing over the last
| couple of years is kind of impressive.
| coldpie wrote:
| It's a good question, and a very good thing to think about. It
| turns out shipping is actually surprisingly low on the list of
| contributors to carbon emissions. All global shipping together
| contributes about 1.7% of global emissions. That's in
| comparison to, say, industrial energy usage (24.2%) or
| passenger cars (11.9%) or residential buildings (10.9%) or
| animals raised for food (5.8%). Should carbon emissions of
| shipping be a factor in decisions like this? Unquestionably,
| yes. But at worst it's going to be a small tick in the negative
| column, and could actually come out ahead depending on other
| factors like local emissions regulations, etc.
|
| Source: https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2020/09/Emissions-
| by-sect...
| kipchak wrote:
| Apparently shipping is slightly unusual as it produces a
| greater than average amount Sulfur Oxide due to bunker fuel's
| higher sulfur content though it is not considered a
| greenhouse gas such as in the graph. This is where headlines
| like "One cargo ship emits as much pollutants as 50 million
| cars" comes from, though the calculation is debatable.[1]
|
| For comparison gas or diesel is something like 10-15ppm
| Sulfur in the US now while historically bunker fuel is
| historically more like 3-5%, though it has been decreasing
| with regulations. [2]
|
| [1]https://www.cadmatic.com/en/resources/articles/does-one-
| ship...
|
| [2]https://www.epa.gov/diesel-fuel-standards/diesel-fuel-
| standa...
| M4v3R wrote:
| One unrelated correction - you mentioned passenger cars are
| responsible for 11.9% of global emissions, but your source
| says this figure is for the whole road transport. Passenger
| cars AFAIK account for the third of that.
| coldpie wrote:
| Yes, good catch. I was getting that mixed up with the US
| EPA's stats[1]. FWIW they say passenger cars account for
| 58% of all transportation emissions within the US, more
| than all trucking, flights, and shipping combined. Again,
| within the US.
|
| [1] https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/fast-facts-
| transportation-...
| lnsru wrote:
| Filter is couple square millimeters of thin material. If they
| are still on water then it's few big crates of filters for all
| year's production.
| runjake wrote:
| To head off the inevitable low quality comments, keep in mind
| that Broadcom != Qualcomm.
|
| Qualcomm manufactures cellular components for mobile platforms.
| Broadcom is a different company.
| paxys wrote:
| You are the only one I have ever seen conflate the two.
| shapefrog wrote:
| If I squint really really really hard they both have "com"
| towards the end of their names.
| kitsunesoba wrote:
| I always knew Broadcom as "that company that makes WiFi+BT
| chipsets that are a pain to use under Linux", vs Qualcomm "the
| company that dominates the Android ARM SoC market".
| gumby wrote:
| Oh, well this deal will definitely help with the openness
| issue!
|
| (I like a lot of things about Apple but their lack of
| interest in documenting hardware is one of this things I
| don't. It's ironic given that without Burrell Smith and his
| doc there would have been no Macintosh).
| GeekyBear wrote:
| > their lack of interest in documenting hardware
|
| They have their hardware repair documentation online as
| part of their self service repair program, although I don't
| think they have finished adding all their products to the
| program.
|
| > Read the repair manual for your iPhone, Mac laptop, Mac
| desktop or Apple display model to familiarize yourself with
| the steps required and the parts, tools, and materials
| needed for your model and repair type.
|
| https://support.apple.com/self-service-repair
| kelnos wrote:
| I think the parent was talking about chip/register-level
| documentation, to allow people to write open-source
| drivers and the like.
| [deleted]
| i2cmaster wrote:
| They seem to document it and just not (intentionally)
| publish the documents.
| Tuna-Fish wrote:
| Android ARM SoCs are a tiny part of Qualcomm. What you should
| actually know Qualcomm as is: "The company that developed or
| acquired all of modern wireless comms tech, and thus gets
| paid very high license fees for everything that includes
| anything that talks to anything else over the air."
|
| Although I think they are building up the ARM SoC business
| because some of their key patents are about to expire?
| duckmysick wrote:
| > The company that developed or acquired all of modern
| wireless comms tech, and thus gets paid very high license
| fees for everything that includes anything that talks to
| anything else over the air.
|
| How come they aren't regulated by antitrust laws?
| rmilk wrote:
| Apple tried. Recall the huge IP licensing battle from a
| year or two ago where Apple challenged Qualcomm on base
| price for royalties and what was considered FRAND given
| some of the patents were incorporated into the
| communication protocol standards.
|
| Here is one of the HN articles, there are plenty more:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15399689
| SSLy wrote:
| antitrust enforcement is non-existent for B2B markets
| p_j_w wrote:
| >The company that developed or acquired all of modern
| wireless comms tech, and thus gets paid very high license
| fees for everything that includes anything that talks to
| anything else over the air.
|
| This isn't a great summary of Qualcomm. Their cell modems
| are the best in the business. Apple has been working on
| developing their own, and were rumored to try using them in
| their phones this year, but it's sounding like this still
| won't happen because they're not up to snuff yet. One needs
| to only read /r/GooglePixel to find out how well Samsung's
| modems work, and the news there isn't good. This is true
| even for 5G, which Qualcomm don't have locked down in
| patents so well as LTE.
|
| >Although I think they are building up the ARM SoC business
| because some of their key patents are about to expire?
|
| What? Their ARM SoC business has been on the same steady
| path for a decade now. Apple's SoCs are better, but no one
| gets to buy those. Everyone who has a choice uses Qualcomm
| SoCs, except again, Google Pixel, which use Samsung SoCs.
| Not even Samsung uses Samsung SoCs in their phones anymore.
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| I interviewed at qualcomm once, and when entering the
| building you are greeted by a reception desk flanked by two
| prominant walls on either side. Those walls are covered,
| top to bottom left to right, in golden embossed plaques of
| all their patents.
|
| Qualcomm really really likes their IP.
| andromeduck wrote:
| Intel and Nvidia are the same.
| robotnikman wrote:
| >gets paid very high license fees for everything that
| includes anything that talks to anything else over the air
|
| And I think this is the major reason why they have
| stagnated and have not come out with any ARM SoC's capable
| of matching what Apple has. They can just rest on their
| laurels collecting rent from all their license fees while
| releasing an unimpressive new SoC every once in a while
|
| I really hope one of the big x86 chip makers decides to dip
| their toes into ARM at some point
| stefan_ wrote:
| Honestly the only reason Qualcomm develops ARM SoCs is so
| that they can bundle their modems into them and give
| customers that one chip solution they are looking for.
| tombert wrote:
| Is that still true? My home built router and my server are
| both running Broadcom 10G ethernet cards I didn't have do so
| anything outside of enabling with ifconfig.
|
| For the record, the OS's I tried this on were ClearOS and
| Nixos, but I have no reason to think it wouldn't work with
| other Linuxes.
| AdmiralAsshat wrote:
| They used to require installing a proprietary driver, IIRC,
| which meant you'd have a bootstrapping problem with your
| new laptop if you didn't have an Ethernet port handy.
|
| For that reason I'd usually replace the WiFi chip in my
| Linux laptops with an Intel 7265 or later, as those had in-
| kernel support.
| kitsunesoba wrote:
| The drivers have a penchant to break with routine updates
| too, which is irritating to say the least. There's been a
| few times where on a machine with Broadcom wifi I've
| found myself without a connection after updating and no
| ethernet connection handy, forcing me to tether from my
| phone to get wifi working again.
|
| I'm happy that Intel WiFi+BT chipsets have been popular
| in recent years. Those work great basically everywhere
| and don't randomly break.
| ralgozino wrote:
| I'm surprised nobody mentioned that Broadcom is also in
| process of buying VMware, the topic has been largely
| discussed here
| InvaderFizz wrote:
| Because outside of F500 and legacy tech, VMware is largely
| irrelevant now. It's an interesting footnote, nothing to
| get excited over as for most of us it makes no difference.
| jvanderbot wrote:
| Broadcom also makes the main cpu for rasp pi.
| neilv wrote:
| It's amusing to imagine Raspberry Pi actually being a
| brilliant marketing strategy by Broadcom all along.
| bee_rider wrote:
| I'm sure it was part of their calculus, providing a
| crucial part for this kind of hobbyist/introductory
| device can't hurt business. Sort of like giving away free
| academic software.
| joezydeco wrote:
| Reverse that. Raspberry Pi started with a Broadcom SoC that
| the market rejected.
| bgorman wrote:
| The current Broadcom is actually a spin-off from HP. This
| spin-off (Avago) has been on a massive mergers and
| acquisitions spree over the last decade. This culminated with
| Avago buying Broadcom and renaming itself to Broadcom.
|
| Some of the crappy Wifi+BT chipsets that were sold under
| broadcom were actually sold off to another company, Cypress
| Semiconductor.
| jpgvm wrote:
| However both are fabless design companies. By "manufacturing"
| in the US they don't mean building their own fabs etc but
| rather contracting with a US based company vs Chinese, South
| Korean or Taiwanese.
| vlovich123 wrote:
| Is this satire?
| tombert wrote:
| I might be a bit of an idiot, but Realtek and Broadcom seem
| to occupy basically the same spot in my brain. They're two
| companies that do nominally similar things and I'm not smart
| enough to always differentiate them.
|
| I could totally see someone hearing a vaguely similar name
| working on vaguely similar products and getting them
| confused.
| runjake wrote:
| No. Go on any other site with this story and read the
| comments and it's full of "Apple's crawling back to Broadcom
| with it's tail between it's legs, because it couldn't design
| it's own LTE chips", referring to it's relationship with
| another company, Qualcomm.
| brookst wrote:
| People mix them up all the time, especially Very
| Knowledgeable People Who Know Everything.
| AlotOfReading wrote:
| It isn't helped by the fact that Broadcom tried to acquire
| Qualcomm a few years ago to make them into the same
| company.
| brookst wrote:
| Wonder if the combined company would have been BroadQual
| or ComComm?
| tolien wrote:
| Might be too much exposure to RAF Luton (e.g. the Lancaster
| provides Bouncy Operational Ordnance Ballistic Services),
| but I was expecting those capitalised words to spell
| something out.
| renewiltord wrote:
| I believe current terminology for that is "hallucination".
| Organic LLMs hallucinate answers and can't provide sources
| for their thoughts.
| brookst wrote:
| As an organic LLM, I'm not able to consider myself
| fallible.
| tesseract wrote:
| And for what it's worth today's Broadcom is actually Avago -
| which got its start as HP's semiconductor division - after
| having acquired Broadcom and adopting its name.
| MichaelZuo wrote:
| It's like how Boeing is actually Mcdonnell-Douglas.
| meepmorp wrote:
| All the worst parts of MD, specifically the management.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| It has been 25+ years since the merge, surely there is no
| distinction anymore given people retire in that timeframe.
| antonjs wrote:
| Yet culture persists.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _It 's like how Boeing is actually Mcdonnell-Douglas._
|
| And how AT&T is actually Southwestern Bell.
| alberth wrote:
| Or how Bank of America is actually NationsBank.
| alberth wrote:
| Does this mean Apple has given up trying to design/manufacturer
| their own modem/radio antenna?
|
| Reminder, Apple:
|
| - Paid $4.5B to Qualcomm to settle the lawsuit & gain modem/radio
| patents
|
| - Paid $1B to Intel to acquire their radio division
|
| All under the plan to build their own SoC modem/radio.
|
| This would be a _significant_ course change in Apple 's plans if
| this means they have given up on this plan and will instead use
| Broadcom.
| borissk wrote:
| No, they are just going to use Broadcom components in their
| modem.
| brookst wrote:
| I don't think it means that. It seems to say that Apple will
| buy components for RF, not necessarily modems and antennas.
|
| I'd be very surprised if Apple gave up on their internal
| modems. Not sure about whether the plan was ever to make
| antennas or just to have IP protection for option value. But
| there are a ton of other parts in the RF stack.
| TradingPlaces wrote:
| My read is this is primarily radio filters, and all the stuff
| they were already buying from Qualcomm. There are a lot of them
| in 5G iPhones. Biggest loser here in my read is Skyworks, who
| provided a lot of the front-end-modules.
| Dowwie wrote:
| Fort Collins
| not_literally wrote:
| Device Assembly in the US would be very interesting.
| e-clinton wrote:
| Curious how many dollars it would add to each iPhone.
| bluGill wrote:
| That depends. The US is really cheap if your factory is fully
| automated, and Apple makes enough phones that full automation
| seems like it should be a win. For smaller production runs
| cheap labor is cheaper than the cost of building automation.
| Optimizing these curves is hard. (Note that China is really a
| lot cost of labor country anymore, and so production is
| moving away, but this is a long slow process, not to mention
| China is investing in automation and reportedly doing well)
| fsflover wrote:
| Purism already do this.
| jagger27 wrote:
| So does Apple with the Mac Pro and a ton of historical pre-
| Intel Macs.
| fsflover wrote:
| But not with phones.
| DrBenCarson wrote:
| Yes bc iPhones are a much more global product than
| MacBooks.
| DRW_ wrote:
| They don't do it with the MacBooks either, just Mac Pros.
| DrBenCarson wrote:
| MacBooks don't exist anymore
| akhosravian wrote:
| Literally every single Laptop Apple sells is branded as
| "MacBook". Its really adds nothing to point out someone
| didn't add the word "Pro" or "Air".
| YourDadVPN wrote:
| Is that why Librem 5s cost 10x other phones with similar
| hardware?
| j45 wrote:
| Wow, talk about coming full circle.
| j45 wrote:
| Specifically
|
| https://appleinsider.com/articles/23/01/09/apple-looking-to-...
| chrgy wrote:
| Lots of companies are cutting ties with China, Apple is obligated
| to do so. But the more companies cutting ties with China, make it
| easier for both China and US to have Military conflict on Taiwan.
| Replicating TSMC is in the making by intel but It will take
| Years, and would have been nice if APPLE, AMD and Nvidia would
| Start a Fab Together in the US as a part of the Chips ACT.
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| I listened to an interview with the former CEO (and now
| chairman) of Microchip the other day. Microchip actually turned
| down money beyond $150MM from the chips act because it had too
| many strings attached to make building a fab with it
| worthwhile.
| bsder wrote:
| We call them Microcheap for a reason ...
|
| And it's kind of stupid because Microchip is _still_ having
| 52+ week delivery issues. ST has gained three customers that
| I know of becuase of this.
| himinlomax wrote:
| If ST gains customer because of their better lead times ...
| that means Microchip must really, really sucks.
|
| Fun fact: ST management panicked at the start of the
| pandemic, started immediately downsizing, afaik they still
| haven't been able to catch up to demand.
| m-ee wrote:
| We use both at my job, sustaining products with microchip
| and pre production with ST, it's about even for terrible
| lead times. At least with ST I don't have terrible debug
| hardware on top of my terrible lead times. I don't know
| why anyone would use microchip for a new product, maybe
| bought in to the Atmel ARM chips already?
| xwowsersx wrote:
| Why is Apple obligated to do so?
| smoldesu wrote:
| Presumably because they care _so much_ about privacy being a
| human right, and every day This Page[0] exists it breaks
| their heart. Breaking ties with China would be a great way to
| start getting tough on autocratic privacy overreach.
|
| [0] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351
| local_crmdgeon wrote:
| you have cause and effect backwards here.
|
| https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/decoupling-is-just-going-to-ha...
| WhyNotHugo wrote:
| As a third party, it's kinda sad that the US is so invested in
| going to war and seeking even more conflict.
|
| All this energy could be invested in cooperating and building
| together. Instead, it's being wasted in preparing for yet
| another pointless armed conflict. It's not like we don't have
| enough problems already.
| DontchaKnowit wrote:
| I mean you can stick your fingers into all your various
| sensory orifices and ignore the growing turmoil between
| Taiwan and China all you want, but the reality is that there
| is nothing the US can or will do that will prevent China from
| doing what they please with regards to Taiwan.
| theandrewbailey wrote:
| > As a third party, it's kinda sad that China is so invested
| in going to war and seeking even more conflict.
|
| FTFY. China is the actively belligerent party when it comes
| to Taiwan. The US doesn't want to invade either one. Don't
| forget the ongoing Uighur genocide in Xinjiang.
| Tostino wrote:
| Just wondering what your thoughts are on China's self
| determination in deciding to invade or not? Why are you
| acting like the US is the one invading another nation?
| mistermann wrote:
| If you examine military actions over the last several
| decades, it's not that difficult to form an opinion that
| the United States is the most aggressive military on the
| global geopolitical stage.
|
| Perhaps this impression is wrong, I would be happy to read
| any statistics that demonstrate that this is not actually
| true.
| fundad wrote:
| I think these posts equating decoupling and war are from
| CPP troll farms.
| borissk wrote:
| Complete nonsense. Cooperating with Putin lead to the
| invasion of Ukraine. Cooperating with the Chinese Communist
| Party can only lead to the invasion of Taiwan.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _the more companies cutting ties with China, make it easier
| for both China and US to have Military conflict on Taiwan_
|
| The coefficient of trade and belligerence is about 0.2, _i.e._
| "a doubling of trade on average leads to a 20% diminution of
| belligerence" [1]. And trade with China continues to grow [2].
| I wouldn't read the semiconductor re-shoring as materially
| changing the odds of a war _per se_.
|
| [1] https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Solomon-
| Polachek/public...
|
| [2] https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html
| pphysch wrote:
| > Lots of companies are cutting ties with China
|
| Do you have anything to back this up, preferably not cherry-
| picking pandemic data?
|
| Last I checked Apple had 90% of their manufacturing done in
| China and lost an Indian supplier this week.
|
| Bing apparently just became the #1 search engine in China among
| desktop users (whatever that means).
|
| China just came out of nowhere as the #1 car exporter.
|
| The idea that the world will isolate China on behalf of
| Washington is a unipolar pipe dream.
| threeseed wrote:
| > The idea that the world will isolate China on behalf of
| Washington
|
| Countries are doing it because of economic coercion.
|
| China has banned Australian products from import (in
| violation of WTO rules) because of its position on Taiwan,
| Quad, Chinese foreign investment etc. Similarly for Sweden.
|
| Which is one reason why EU has not been keen on a
| comprehensive FTA with China.
| pphysch wrote:
| It's a stretch to call it "coercion" when it is directly in
| response to offenses committed against China [1] and
| primarily driven by Washington. Framing every negative
| action as coercion, regardless of causality, drains that
| word of meaning.
|
| The bottom line is China wants to do business, but
| Washington wants China to be contained.
|
| [1] -
| https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2020/12/1/australia-
| china-...
| threeseed wrote:
| You weren't clear what offences Australia has committed
| to China or why you are making this about US.
|
| Banning Huawei over national security concerns or asking
| for an independent inquiry into the source of COVID is
| hardly offensive. And they are not excuses for refusing
| to abide by WTO rules and inventing reasons to prevent
| free and fair trade.
|
| What is offensive is China providing a list of 14
| grievances that Australia must address (e.g. supporting
| China's take over of Taiwan) in order to maintain a
| normal economic relationship.
| pphysch wrote:
| > You weren't clear what offences Australia has committed
| to China or why you are making this about US.
|
| I cited it, you just didn't bother to read it.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _China wants to do business, but Washington wants China
| to be contained_
|
| China expelling diplomats and cutting economic ties
| because an Australian college student said something mean
| or Baltic nation didn't agree with the party line on
| Taiwan is not wanting to do business.
| pphysch wrote:
| In virtually every case these are explicit tit-for-tat
| actions.
| tatrajim wrote:
| In East Asia, China-South Korea relations have turned rocky
| over the past ten years, due to frustration on the part of
| China over South Korea's continued military alliance with the
| U.S. (e.g. the THAAD radar issue in 2017 that ended by
| ruining the burgeoning Korean Lotte network of shopping
| centers across China). Samsung used to be huge in China, but
| now it's largely domestic brands Huawei, Xiaomi, Oppo et al.
| Samsung had a massive phone assembly plant in Tianjin, but
| moved to northern Vietnam.
|
| From a Korea perspective, the proprietorial attitude of many
| Chinese ("Korea used be part of China" Xi Jinping told Donald
| Trump), and the penumbra of nationalism in the PRC have
| resulted in a major shift in public opinion from 2000. Now
| some 80% of South Korean youth view China unfavorably, and
| that seems unlikely to improve in the near future.
| manv1 wrote:
| The whole point of bringing countries like China into the world
| economic system is to make sure that they realize that
| aggressive action is counterproductive and they refrain from
| doing so.
|
| Unfortunately that hasn't really worked with China, which is
| why the world is starting to decouple from China; the CPP still
| prioritizes its institutional needs over "The People", which is
| ironic since they're supposed to be working for "The People."
|
| That's probably why the CPP is scared of the people and tries
| to control them.
| thrashh wrote:
| The world is really decoupling with China because it is so
| unpredictable. Xi made himself forever leader only 10 years
| ago and it's been a unpredictable rollercoaster of policy
| since then.
|
| Stability is the foundation of every working relationship.
| Everyone wants to latch onto you when you are stable. You can
| even work with an adversary as long as they are stable. China
| had it for a while before Xi.
|
| Most countries have yet to achieve long-term stability.
| Stability is super difficult to achieve.
| nkotov wrote:
| If I'm not wrong, I believe Apple in the late 80s and 90s
| manufactured in the US, and again in the 2010s with the Mac Pro.
| I remember reading somewhere that they lost a ton of money
| because of it.
| tambourine_man wrote:
| Steve was fanatical about automated factories for the original
| Mac and NeXT cubes. He kept bragging that their factories were
| the most advanced in the world, better than Japanese, etc.
|
| Cook went the other direction, outsourcing to humans on other
| continents.
| Clubber wrote:
| The "garbage can," model. I have one. It was double the price
| of the previous generation MacPro, 1/4 as upgradable and had
| some serious thermal issues. It is considered a flop, but I
| liked mine. I got it used.
|
| https://support.apple.com/kb/sp697?locale=en_US
| bilsbie wrote:
| Reshoring
| syngrog66 wrote:
| great news. China-Taiwan war chances seem high enough would be
| wise to reduce our dependence on both wherever we can
| fundad wrote:
| not to mention 6 years of a trade war
| marktangotango wrote:
| Not SoCs, but radio gear:
|
| > The multi-year agreement with Broadcom will see Apple use 5G
| radio frequency and wireless connectivity components, including
| FBAR filters, that are designed and manufactured in the U.S.
| georgeglue1 wrote:
| Given the sensitivity on 5G, I'm not really sure Apple or
| Broadcom ever really had a choice.
|
| Various regulators probably wouldn't let Apple use 5G
| components produced outside of a [TBD democratic ally of the
| US]
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