Bloomberg New Economy: Semiconductors Are China’s Choke Point
A silicon wafer made by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. at the company’s headquarters in Hsinchu.
Photographer: Maurice Tsai/Bloomberg
The rule of thumb in the semiconductor industry—Moore’s law—states that the number of transistors on a microchip doubles every couple of years.
That figure, improbably, is headed into the trillions. Meanwhile, the tally of companies that can afford to keep pace with the investments necessary to pile all those transistors on to a silicon wafer has moved just as dramatically in the opposite direction: only three remain at the cutting edge of manufacturing, down from about 25 in 2002. One of those, Intel, is flagging.