The High Cost of Upholding Moored Law

摘要

Anew leading-edge microchip fabrication facility, or fab, costs $3 billion to $5 billion to build. The high capital cost means that fabs must keep their production lines running at full capacity in order to pay back the money sunk into them. "The most expensive thing on the planet is a half-empty fab" says Brian Krzanich, general manager of Intel's manufacturing and supply chain. Consequently, only the highest-volume processor manufacturers-such as Samsung and Intel-are still sole owners and operators of state-of-the-art plants.