Chip War

During the war in Vietnam, the American forces in a bombing campaign named ‘Operation Rolling Thunder’, stretched from 1965 to 1968, dropped over eight hundred thousand tons of bombs, more than was dropped in the Pacific Theater during all of World War II. This had little impact on North Vietnam’s military, since most of the bombs missed their target. Whereas, on January 17, 1991, two US F-117s stealth bombers, took off from their airbase in Saudi Arabia and released two two-thousand-pound LASER-GUIDED bombs on the twelve-storey telephone exchange building on Baghdad’s Rashid Street, scoring direct hits, knocking out Iraq’s critical communications center. Simultaneously, 116 Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from US naval ships offshore slammed into their targets; military command posts, air force headquarters and power stations, with pin point accuracy. The Iraqi military was in shock, disorganised and in retreat as the world watched these events from the comfort of their homes on CNN. The silicon chip had won the Iraqi war. This book is the fascinating story of this powerful technology that has structured our history and will shape our future. It is also unique in the sense that it covers multiple facets of the highly complex Silicon Chip; Technological, Historical, Commercial, Global and Strategic. Firstly, it traces the birth of the semi-conductor technology, starting from 1945, when William Shockley first theorised what he called a ‘solid state valve’. On the afternoon of December 16,1947, the first rudimentary semiconductor device was switched on successfully at Bell Labs’ headquarters by John Bardeen and Walter Brattain. The “transistor” was born. Soon Robert Noyce and Jack Kilby were credited for inventing the first ‘Integrated Circuit’. ‘Moore’s law’ laid the foundation for the exponential growth of the power of the silicon chip. Next is the excellent description of the entire global value chain and the companies involved in leadership positions at critical points. Chip design is led in the USA by companies like Apple, AMD, Intel, Amazon, TI, IBM, TESLA, Facebook, Nvidia and Google and these form the architecture or blueprint of the circuit on the silicon chip. Silicon chip manufacture is a capital-intensive operation costing over USD 20 billion, with short lifespans (high Clock Speeds) and hence independent chip manufacturers share their capacities across multiple customers to quickly absorb costs. Since chip assembly was labor intensive, it was off-shored to locations like Taiwan, South Korea and Malaysia. Soon Taiwan led by TSMC (founded by Morris Chang), emerged the global leader in chip fabrication. ASLM of Netherlands has over 80 percent market share in the EUV (Extreme Ultra-violet Lithography) technology that enables ‘printing’ of miniature circuits, as thin as 3 nanometers. Intel’s decision to exit from DRAM chips and enter logic chips is the story of ‘Only the Paranoid Survive’, once again brought in with a refreshing touch. Though ‘Moore’s Law’ is technically coming to its limit in terms of the density of transistors in a chip, the computing power of the chip is expected to rise at least a hundred-fold, thanks to new technologies like 3D FinFET transistors and ‘gate-all-around’. We realise the importance of the silicon chip, and in its absence all our appliances, cars, power stations and even a toaster would not function. In addition, as demonstrated in the Gulf War of 1991, silicon chips make the difference on the battlefield. The ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict is another example. Ukraine, with smart shoulder fired missiles like the Javelin that are guided by 20 silicon chips are able to effortlessly knock out Russia’s heavy armor and tanks. The sudden shortage of silicon chips in 2021 has awakened the world on the importance of this industry, the concentration of manufacturing and global choke points that need to be de-risked. While the cold war between USA and Russia is over, China is now a threat to the US military. China is in an envious position of being the biggest threat, and yet the biggest customer of US technology, importing more chips than oil. China has its eyes firmly on Taiwan and the Taiwan strait is militarily the most strategic theatre, should there be a conflict. Taiwan is a great temptation, since it manufactures 37 percent of all chips, and perhaps 80 percent of all high-end chips. Attempts by US to restrict export of latest chips to China have met with limited success. The chapter ‘Assault on Huawei’ narrates the US policy response to check the technological threat from China. The story of the chip is not over. With GPU, AI, 5G and many more advanced technologies, this is only the beginning of a new digital era. Not many books are so engaging, informative and thought-provoking. Exceptionally good.

“Chip War” is a detailed documentation of the history of silicon ships covering the early days of the industry and the early years of companies such as Texas Instruments and Intel, the attempts of countries such as Russia to emulate the American success, Japan’s (mainly Sony’s) rise, US’ eventual dominance, the emergence of Taiwan as an offshore centre and ending with the current geopolitical implications entering around China and Taiwan. The breadth of the book is tremendous, and Miller manages to cover it in about 350 crisp pages without skimping on the important details. The only complaint I had was that a major portion of the book is largely like a historical narrative on the subject, not surprising given Miller’s background as a historian. For someone like me who’s been a stock market analyst in the technology sector, most of the information was not new. But even then, there were these little nuggets of information, the small insights into events and people that took the industry forward and some interesting anecdotes that compensated for this. Also, the last part of the book which covers the future implications of this race between the US and China to get the upper hand in this area, exacerbated by China’s intent to eschew economic integration, constitutes a well-written opinion piece. Overall, “Chip War” is a fascinating read for all, easily understood by readers new to the topic and with enough nuggets to satisfy even those familiar with the topic. Jerry Sanders, co-founder of AMD, had famously said that semiconductors were the crude oil of the 1980s. Since then, their importance has only grown and one could argue that the outcome of this chip war has the potential to influence the future of individual countries and even humankind, making it an incredibly relevant topic and the book an interesting read. Pros: The breadth of coverage of the topic, interesting factoids and anecdotes, insightful discussion into the current and potential geopolitical implications Cons: May drag a bit in places for readers familiar with the subject

Invention of semiconductor chip . How it transformed individual life .. how it affecting world politics .. many questions answered and many gets created while reading this book. Inter dependence on one country over other ..we get to see true globalisation .. a new world oder centred on chip. How US try to controlled the world via this chip business and china want to become self reliant about chip business.. how Russia used spycraft .. china murky business practices to gain the chip business in their control. And the centre of it is Taiwan capturing the 50 percent of market. So many insights about smartphone which lifted this business to new height. Worth and important read

Chip war gave a clear idea where and how semiconductors started and how it is progressing. Thanks for the insights the author gave as to how the leading companies are placed in semi conductors.. The last few chapters were little boring, as I knew what happened in the last 10-15 years.. but initial days were simply awesome. Sometimes reading history brings happiness and kudos to the author for bringing them with such impeccable clarity! Thanks CNBC for suggesting the book when I was seeing an episode on ASML and EUV!

The book came in a good quality and is the original copy

It’s a well-researched and deeply informative read that walks through the semiconductor labyrinth — political influence, rise and fall of corporates, Government fundings, intellectual property battles, espionage, and innovation. Having spent over 25 years in the semiconductor industry, I could connect so many dots while reading. For me, this book reads like a True novel on Chips. If you’re in the semiconductor field, I’d highly recommend read of this one. can not agree more with the Author “The future of war will be defined by computing power.”

Interesting and very informative book on semiconductor chips. The author has provided detailed glossary and explanatory notes about various terms, products and processes for easy understanding. A very detailed analysis of how these chips shape current global affairs, balance of military power and structure of world economy. The book is excellent.

Very insightful and detailed. The content totally highlights the research efforts put together by the author and the editorial team. Must read for every tech enthusiast and business leaders.