Nearly Every Big Tech Company Joined the New Semiconductors in America Coalition

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Apple, Microsoft, and many other big tech companies today announced the formation of the Semiconductors in America Coalition (SIAC) lobbying group, whose first order of business was lending its support to the CHIPS for America Act.

The companies said in a press release that SIAC’s “mission is to advance federal policies that promote semiconductor manufacturing and research in the U.S. to strengthen America’s economy, national security, and critical infrastructure.”

Supporting the CHIPS for America Act is a logical first step. SIAC explained in its press release that the act, which was introduced in June 2020, would “appropriate $50 billion for domestic chip manufacturing incentives and research initiatives.”

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) and President Joe Biden have both lent their support to the act, which was approved by the House and the Senate as part of the National Defense Authorization Act for 2021 but has not yet been funded.

SIAC wants to secure that funding. It said in a letter to Congressional leadership:

“The current shortage of semiconductors is impacting a broad range of industries throughout the economy. To address this problem in the short term, government should refrain from intervening as industry works to correct the current supply-demand imbalance causing the shortage. But for the longer term, robust funding of the CHIPS Act would help America build the additional capacity necessary to have more resilient supply chains to ensure critical technologies will be there when we need them. Manufacturing incentives funded by Congress should focus on filling key gaps in our domestic semiconductor ecosystem and cover the full range of semiconductor technologies and process nodes – from legacy to leading-edge – relied on by industry, the military, and critical infrastructure.”

SIAC counts seemingly every company that designs, manufactures, or uses semiconductors among its members. The full list—which includes 64 members split into four groups—can be found on the group’s website. Here are a few standouts:

  • TSMC
  • Intel
  • AMD
  • Nvidia
  • Arm
  • Samsung
  • Qualcomm
  • Broadcom
  • Google
  • AWS

And many others besides. It turns out nothing brings companies together quite like the prospect of receiving—or helping their suppliers receive—$50 billion to help address the chip shortage that’s affecting practically every aspect of the industry.

Nathaniel Mott
Freelance News & Features Writer

Nathaniel Mott is a freelance news and features writer for Tom's Hardware US, covering breaking news, security, and the silliest aspects of the tech industry.

  • ezst036
    People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.

    - Adam Smith

    Biden announced not long ago free money for the super-wealthy semiconductor sector, it makes sense they would collude in corporatist fashion as a result.
    Reply
  • gg83
    that is one powerful lobby group.
    Reply
  • JeffTX
    Under the heading of the Everett Dirksen saying "A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking real money. ":

    "Supporting the CHIPS for America Act is a logical first step. SIAC explained in its press release that the act, which was introduced in June 2020, would “appropriate $50 billion for domestic chip manufacturing incentives and research initiatives.”

    Take from the people and give to the corporations. It's one thing to offer tax breaks to corporations, because people pay taxes, companies pass along costs to people.

    Didn't the companies leave on their own to reduce costs? I'm 100% on board bringing critical supply chain items back to the USA, but how we incent that to happen is another matter.
    Reply
  • Allen_B
    So let’s see… these companies are collectively sitting on hundreds of billions of dollars in cash and equivalents. Seems to me there’s a clear solution to funding leading-edge fab capability in the United States.
    Reply
  • daworstplaya
    Let's face it "free market capitalism" is broken, especially when you have the government of other countries funding their own tech sectors to get a leg up on the competition. This is why US companies are falling behind, can't compete and are losing out to foreign tech companies. It's only leveling the playing field when the US govt gets involved to support US based companies to compete. If you want "free market" to work then the other countries govts shouldn't support their tech sectors, but that ship has sailed a long time ago. Now what we have is an arms race.
    Reply
  • Co BIY
    daworstplaya said:
    Let's face it "free market capitalism" is broken, especially when you have the government of other countries funding their own tech sectors to get a leg up on the competition. This is why US companies are falling behind, can't compete and are losing out to foreign tech companies. It's only leveling the playing field when the US govt gets involved to support US based companies to compete. If you want "free market" to work then the other countries govts shouldn't support their tech sectors, but that ship has sailed a long time ago. Now what we have is an arms race.

    A major source of the damage to the "free-market" system was the addition of 1.2 billion unfree people under the control of an aggressive state to the system without watchfulness.

    The idea of allowing Communist China entrance into the global free-trade system in the hopes that the increased ties would lead to internal liberation was naïve but maybe not foolish. But now that we see how it has turned out it is idiocy to continue in the same way. Unfortunately global elites and their multi-national corporations have disproportionately benefited from the situation and it's hard to give that up.
    Reply