The U.S. White House held a semiconductor video summit on April 12 to discuss how to improve supply chain transparency and increase U.S. semiconductor production capacity to face the current and future challenges of chip shortages. President Joe Biden briefly met online with the heads of nearly 20 major companies participating in the meeting, and Taiwan’s leading semiconductor industry leader TSMC was also invited, but no Chinese companies were seen in the list. China’s Global Times criticized the U.S. for exacerbating global supply woes in this regard.
The White House Semiconductor Online Summit invited 19 senior executives from related companies around the world to discuss how to strengthen the semiconductor supply chain and solve the chip shortage problem, and U.S. President Joe Biden also “briefly joined” the meeting. In his post-summit speech, he promoted the $2.3 trillion infrastructure plan proposed in late March, part of which is to promote the development of high-tech manufacturing in the United States
“China and the rest of the world are not waiting, and there’s no reason for Americans to wait.” Biden said, “We need to build the infrastructure of today, not fix the infrastructure of yesterday.”
Referring to letters he received from 23 senators and 42 representatives from both parties in support of relevant semiconductor policies, Biden said the letters refer to the Chinese Communist Party’s “aggressive plans to reposition and dominate the semiconductor supply chain” and the money Beijing is investing to achieve that goal. Biden also called for U.S. unity to ensure readiness for the coming global competition.
In a statement issued after the meeting on Monday evening, the White House mentioned that senior executives at the meeting stressed the importance of alleviating the current chip shortage by increasing transparency in the semiconductor supply chain, while improving forecasts of demand in the supply chain would also help alleviate future challenges. In addition, the statement also mentioned that the meeting also discussed encouraging increased semiconductor manufacturing capacity in the United States, and talked about the Biden administration’s infrastructure plan will build tomorrow’s infrastructure and enhance supply chain resilience to achieve the purpose of enhancing U.S. competitiveness and safeguarding national security.
The meeting, co-chaired by White House national security adviser Sullivan, White House National Economic Council Chairman Brian Deese and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, was not open to the public. “The summit reflects the urgent need to strengthen critical supply chains,” Deese said in a statement.
According to the list of attendees released by the White House, technology companies, the automotive industry, which is severely affected by the chip shortage, as well as leading semiconductor companies and other 19 companies were invited to attend, including Google, Intel, General Motors, Ford, foreign companies are TSMC, South Korea’s Samsung and the Netherlands NXP, of which TSMC is represented by Chairman Liu Deyin.
The list does not include Chinese related companies. Chinese official media Global Times published a report in English the previous day criticizing the event as another Washington-led effort to decouple from China, citing observers who said the chip industry also needs close international cooperation among different industries to achieve economies of scale, so excluding China would increase costs.
“Such a conspiracy would only exacerbate global supply woes as chipmakers could suspend investment plans because of political risks,” the piece reads.
Xie Tian, a business professor at the University of South Carolina, told reporters that the U.S. has been sanctioning Huawei and SMIC one after another due to national security concerns, and excluding Chinese companies is a reasonable move to avoid theft of key technologies and intellectual property.
“Chinese companies produce chips are not the most advanced, nor are they high value-added chips, not involved in the highest level of competition, they (Chinese companies) also do not have the ability to solve these automotive industry, or the international shortage of chips.” Xie Tian said.
White House spokeswoman Sharkey stressed in a press conference earlier on the 12th that in the short term the U.S. government will work with relevant companies and international partners to ensure that U.S. companies do business on a level playing field.
Sharkey: “We need to work closely with Congress to reach consensus on this issue, which is affecting industries across the country, and we also need to work with our allies and partners on how to prevent shortages in the future.”
According to Japanese media “Nikkei News” news, Biden 16 and Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga meeting, one of the key issues is to discuss the semiconductor supply chain cooperation, the establishment of a relevant working group to reduce dependence on other countries. Before this, Biden in February this year has signed an executive order for semiconductor issues, ordering an inventory of four key technology products, the establishment of a flexible supply chain and promote the necessary investment.
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