Page 12 - Chip Scale Review_November December_2022-digital

It is not a zero-sum game made that this market led economy has these efforts to gain strategic autonomy
It is hard to argue that a certain produced an “efficient” global supply cannot ignore the interdependent global
level of global cooperation will be chain, ultimately benefitting everyone. order. Pure unilateral approaches will
needed to make these acts and efforts In an ideal world, cooperation among result in over investment, impede true
successful and more importantly, all nations, each bringing to the table innovation and misallocation of labor
sustainable. Market dynamics have led its own key ability and supply chain and precious resources. The policy
semiconductor manufacturing away dynamics is best for the broader makers will do well to consider the
from the U.S., Europe and Japan (while society. Even in our non-ideal reality, global supply chain order and allow a
they still lead in design) to countries some level of cooperation is a must to certain level of cooperation to ensure a
with lower labor costs over the last few bear fruit from these various efforts positive sustainable outcome.
decades. An argument can be easily akin to the CHIPS Act. Ultimately, all Despite what political leaders across
the globe are trying to achieve, at the
end of the day, it’s not a zero-sum game.
There are pockets of competencies that
have been developed over decades—
both on the technology front and the
cost front. To try to reverse that may
perhaps prove somewhat futile and
lead to an inefficient use of resources.
Nevertheless, the political divides we
see today are a stark reality. And like
everything else, the semiconductor
landscape will also have to adjust to
it despite the possibility of creating
these pockets of inefficiencies for
which, ultimately, consumers will
end up paying. How these particular
government interventions will play
out to reshape the semiconductor
manufacturing landscape, only time will
tell. However, one thing is certain: given
the current trajectory, the landscape will
be starkly different by the end of the
decade from what it is today.

Biography
Asif R. Chowdhury is SVP at UTAC
Group, Singapore. He has over 30 years
of experience in the semiconductor
industry. Before joining UTAC, he held
senior positions at Amkor Technology,
Chandler, AZ, and Analog Devices,
Wilmington, MA. He holds a BS in
Mechanical Engineering from U. of
Texas at Arlington, an MS in Mechanical
Engineering from Southern Methodist
U., and an MS in Finance and an MBA
from Northeastern U. Asif’s first book
on the Japanese work culture entitled,
“A Gaijin Sarariman,” has just been
published by Penguin Random House.
Email asif_chowdhury@utacgroup.com

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