Thread

1. karlkloss · 1790854478 · focus · HN ↗

   We just buried an ASIC design that was nearly finished. Reason: There was a deviation that would've needed a mask change, but because of AI chip demand, the manufacturer wanted so much money for it, that we said screw it.

   So we now have AI powered chip design tools that make chip design cheaper, but because of AI, chip manufacturing has become so expensive, that we can't afford it anymore.

   Nice.

   1. teitoklien · 1790855414 · focus · HN ↗

      AI didn’t make chip manufacturing more expensive

      Manufacturers choosing not to scale with demand or not being able to scale with demand

      Is what constrained the supply.

      Hopefully will be fixed within a decade , then it’s cool new stuff all the way.

      1. imglorp · 1790858532 · focus · HN ↗

         Why aren't boring, old process ASICs isolated from this mess?

         1. jrflo · 1790875399 · focus · HN ↗

            The whole supply chain is so focused on RAM/GPUs that it's affecting everything. I've seen random sensors 3x in price because the company making them has shifted their manufacturing focus.
         2. throwup238 · 1790888277 · focus · HN ↗

            There’s a lot of other boring chips on a server motherboard beyond the RAM and CPU that share older processes with everyone else making silicon. Stuff like power management ICs needed to bring up power to a chip in the right order, which were an annoyance even before COVID and AI.
      2. 01100011 · 1790860742 · focus · HN ↗

         When did chip demand skyrocket?

         How long does it take to ramp up capacity?

      3. mtrovo · 1790861115 · focus · HN ↗

         > Manufacturers choosing not to scale with demand or not being able to scale with demand

         In a vacuum, that would make sense.

         But looking at how the industry works, the number of defunct companies, and how the whole industry got concentrated on the conservative companies, you start to understand that the reason they still exist is mainly because they don't ride fad waves.

         It's not like chip manufacturing is a spot instance on AWS that you spin up and down when needed; these are multi-year, multi-billion dollar investments that require long-term demand studies. The AI approach of requesting a whole fab of demand for the next 5 years with a letter from Jason Hwang that says "trust it, bro" does not bring as much confidence as it appears.

   2. rfgplk · 1790858880 · focus · HN ↗

      Local manufacturing is the next open challenge in hardware. If a pizza can be baked locally, why not chips?

      1. Muromec · 1790859530 · focus · HN ↗

         Pizza making smol machine, low precision, child baking big machine, trees expensive, can't have locally

         1. ewild · 1790860124 · focus · HN ↗

            Used to be a bakers oven was one per town, maybe big precise machine becomes cheap smol precise machine

            1. jacquesm · 1790880248 · focus · HN ↗

               3D printers are a nice analogy, but the complexity level is orders of magnitude higher for chip making, besides the stability of the environment requirements.
         2. bkaae · 1790862426 · focus · HN ↗

            Child baking machine still human job, chip baking is harder
   3. thomasahle · 1790887955 · focus · HN ↗

      What kind of deviation? Was it something AI could have helped catch earlier?

      1. threatripper · 1790889042 · focus · HN ↗

         Earlier there was no AI to catch it.

Unofficial Hacker News client; not affiliated with Y Combinator.