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The credibility point is the most interesting part of this. In semiconductors, having a good design seems secondary to convincing customers that you'll still be

The credibility point is the most interesting part of this. In semiconductors, having a good design seems secondary to convincing customers that you'll still be around to support it years later. RISC-V lowers the barrier to building a CPU, but i'm not sure it lowers the trust barrier nearly as much.

inigyou 1mo ago
I'm not so sure of that. Don't companies often buy a million of a chip and then that's it? Famously the MacBook Neo was created to get rid of some stockpile of old chips Apple was sitting on.
- johncole 1mo ago
  I think this story is the exception. The supply chain time for hardware is so long, designers are picking their chips out months and years in advance. So you really do have to trust that the supplier will be around to support the hardware in a few months or a few years.
- Palomides 1mo ago
  numerically, most companies are not in cutting edge rapid product cycle consumer gear like apple, they instead want to buy 1000/year of the same part for a decade (or maybe gradually better, compatible equivalents)
  - Palomides 1mo ago
    also companies try really hard not to keep huge stockpiles of parts as part of lean manufacturing
- rcxdude 1mo ago
  It depends on the industry. High-volume consumer electronics is often like this (they're making this year's product, they roughly know the demand, they'll be redesigning it in a year or two), but industrial electronics generally wants to know that they will still be able to buy the parts in 10 years, at least (a design or even a single unit can be in active use for decades).
inigyou 1mo ago
Separately from my other comment, European companies seem to have a credibility problem no matter what they do or how well they do it, just because they're outside of the good old boy's club that is Silicon Valley. When's the last time you heard some praise for OVH or IONOS Cloud?
- johncole 1mo ago
  I think the EU is making credible attempts to change this.
  - inigyou 1mo ago
    Not really. It's a capitalist economy, they can only regulate what exists, not bring things into existence. The best they can do is offer grants to those who apply for them.
mcshicks 1mo ago
Umm I would say working physical samples is pretty important.

inigyou 1mo ago

I'm not so sure of that. Don't companies often buy a million of a chip and then that's it? Famously the MacBook Neo was created to get rid of some stockpile of old chips Apple was sitting on.

johncole 1mo ago
I think this story is the exception. The supply chain time for hardware is so long, designers are picking their chips out months and years in advance. So you really do have to trust that the supplier will be around to support the hardware in a few months or a few years.
Palomides 1mo ago
numerically, most companies are not in cutting edge rapid product cycle consumer gear like apple, they instead want to buy 1000/year of the same part for a decade (or maybe gradually better, compatible equivalents)
- Palomides 1mo ago
  also companies try really hard not to keep huge stockpiles of parts as part of lean manufacturing
rcxdude 1mo ago
It depends on the industry. High-volume consumer electronics is often like this (they're making this year's product, they roughly know the demand, they'll be redesigning it in a year or two), but industrial electronics generally wants to know that they will still be able to buy the parts in 10 years, at least (a design or even a single unit can be in active use for decades).

inigyou 1mo ago

Separately from my other comment, European companies seem to have a credibility problem no matter what they do or how well they do it, just because they're outside of the good old boy's club that is Silicon Valley. When's the last time you heard some praise for OVH or IONOS Cloud?

johncole 1mo ago
I think the EU is making credible attempts to change this.
- inigyou 1mo ago
  Not really. It's a capitalist economy, they can only regulate what exists, not bring things into existence. The best they can do is offer grants to those who apply for them.

mcshicks 1mo ago

Umm I would say working physical samples is pretty important.