With military/factory tech it doesn’t always have to be cutting edge chips tho. 7nm isn’t the most cutting edge either. There’s manufactories out there still running on x64 silicon using windows XP that aren’t connected to the internet, but it still works with their old factory hardware so they keep using it.
Just from a security perspective, it doesn’t make sense the EU doesn’t really produce that type of tech locally, especially since the Dutch ASML is the only one of it’s kind in the first place - half the hardware requirements are already here. The educational resources required to train such a workforce are there. The location and money are there.
If war did break out with say like the USA, EU is just automatically cut off, as Taiwan would probably side with USA to keep China off them since there’s not even a significant EU military presence there either. If Russia decides on doing a desperate full salvo, the logistics are cut off too.
For consumer electronics, scientific instrumentation etc sure, relying on Taiwan would still make sense. But for infrastructure and defense, it’s just stupid to have critical supplies be nearly halfway around the world.
Silicon chips is a very globalised industry. The design software is USA/European. The lithographics and optics is European. The fabs and packaging is east Asia and a small amount in USA.
Any two, and you can probably continue at somewhere behind the bleeding edge. If one area tries to do everything by themselves I think they’d currently fail.
Nobody apart from TSMC can replicate the manufacturing process for recent nodes. Anything sub-7nm, you need to use TSMC.
So whilst somebody could build a silicon fabrication plant in Europe, it would be out-of-date before the first shovel hit the ground.
With military/factory tech it doesn’t always have to be cutting edge chips tho. 7nm isn’t the most cutting edge either. There’s manufactories out there still running on x64 silicon using windows XP that aren’t connected to the internet, but it still works with their old factory hardware so they keep using it.
Just from a security perspective, it doesn’t make sense the EU doesn’t really produce that type of tech locally, especially since the Dutch ASML is the only one of it’s kind in the first place - half the hardware requirements are already here. The educational resources required to train such a workforce are there. The location and money are there.
If war did break out with say like the USA, EU is just automatically cut off, as Taiwan would probably side with USA to keep China off them since there’s not even a significant EU military presence there either. If Russia decides on doing a desperate full salvo, the logistics are cut off too.
For consumer electronics, scientific instrumentation etc sure, relying on Taiwan would still make sense. But for infrastructure and defense, it’s just stupid to have critical supplies be nearly halfway around the world.
Silicon chips is a very globalised industry. The design software is USA/European. The lithographics and optics is European. The fabs and packaging is east Asia and a small amount in USA.
Any two, and you can probably continue at somewhere behind the bleeding edge. If one area tries to do everything by themselves I think they’d currently fail.
That’s my point, those chips don’t have to be bleeding edge
And nobody can build something up to date without the Dutch ASML.
True but the process is more than just that one part.