It’s all about who you know

Hi, this is Ian in San Francisco. This was the year chipmaking became all about who you know in government. But first...Today’s must-reads:• [View in browser]( [Bloomberg]( Hi, this is Ian in San Francisco. This was the year chipmaking became all about who you know in government. But first... Today’s must-reads: • The US is [probing]( how $372 million vanished in a hack after FTX filed for bankruptcy • A third Activision game studio is [seeking]( to unionize • An ex-Apple patent attorney says she was [fired](after disclosing abuse Bunny suit lobbyists When Joe Biden headlined the grand opening of a Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. plant in Arizona, he stumbled over the word “nanometer.” The US president made a joke of it, and the audience and fellow speakers, including Apple Inc.’s Tim Cook, laughed indulgently. The scene at the event in early December was significant because it demonstrated what really matters in chipmaking today: who your friends are in government. Proximity to politicians and their newfound interest in and influence of the industry is now, in many ways, as important as access to the best technology. That’s a big shift. Much of the 50-year history of chipmaking was measured in nanometers. Success was determined by which companies had the the sharpest production, which in turn created the better products and economics. The intensifying trade dispute between China and the US and supply disruptions that started with the Covid-19 pandemic changed the chip business. Corporate leaders changed their focus to shaping industrial policy, improving subsidies for factories and navigating sanctions. The US has two goals. It wants to limit China’s ability to develop a domestic chip industry, thereby limiting the nation’s military and surveillance capabilities. America is, like Europe, also trying to reverse a decades-long investment in East Asia that made it the world’s greatest manufacturing hub. The TSMC project in Arizona exemplifies that effort. The Taiwanese company originally planned a smaller facility in a suburb north of Phoenix to produce chips that would have been outdated by the time the factory would come online. Under pressure from the Biden administration and some of its customers — Apple among them — TSMC shifted to a more advanced technology and committed to building more capacity on the same site. The political pressure overrode the natural inclination of chipmakers to keep their best stuff in one location. Historically, that strategy optimized economic and technology advantages and fueled the rise of TSMC and its South Korean rival Samsung Electronics Co. In this new era, many of TSMC’s most valuable customers have decided they don’t want their key components so close to mainland China on an island that Beijing claims control over. Intel Corp. is using its own political influence in an attempt to raise its stature in the chip business. Pat Gelsinger, the chief executive officer, made multiple appearances with Biden over the course of the year. His announcement of a new site in Ohio encouraged some lawmakers to vote for the Chips and Science Act, which will deliver more than $50 billion of public money to help fund US facilities from Intel, TSMC, Samsung and other companies. Intel is also expected to build in Germany with support from a subsidy package Europe is finalizing. Companies less adept at the influence game are losing. Major US providers of chipmaking equipment technology, such as Applied Materials Inc, KLA Corp. and Lam Research, unsuccessfully argued against sanctions. Stricter export restrictions were firmed up this month, and the companies have said they’ll lose out on hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue. Their rivals in the Netherlands and Japan have fared better. ASML NV and Toyko Electron Ltd. have so far been able to persuade their governments to resist US pressure to implement similar Chinese export controls. This victory may be short-lived. Bloomberg’s reporting indicates that the Netherlands and Japanese governments could roll out restrictions as early as next month. The year ahead will involve Western chip companies jockeying for a slice of the almost $100 million in combined aid from the US and European Union. In China, the local chipmakers will likely spend more time in Beijing looking for a hand from the government to circumvent technology embargoes that threaten their existence. —[Ian King](mailto:ianking@bloomberg.net) The big story Where to drown your crypto blues? New Yorkers can [now try]( PubKey, a Bitcoin-themed pub in Greenwich Village. But bring cash. They don’t take Bitcoin. Get fully charged The fraud case against FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried has been [reassigned](to US District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan after the original judge in the case recused herself over a potential conflict of interest. Kaplan is also overseeing author E. Jean Carroll’s battery and defamation suits against former President Donald Trump. This is how fast laid-off tech workers are [finding]( new jobs A military database of [fingerprints]( and iris scans was available for sale on eBay for $68. 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