> It’s the people, facilities and equipment that matter. Those can get picked up by a company or companies that know how to use them.

This trope keeps getting repeated on HN.

No, the point of the top level comment and article is that no US based company will replace Intel's fabs, nor will they form a "better" Intel. This stuff is intensely capital intensive, and nothing short of a government mandate will make any other company spend so much money on such a big risk.

Trust me - if they could have, they would have. Intel's fabs have pretty much been up for sale since Pat was ousted.

The only companies that know how to use the people and the equipment are not US based. TSMC already had an opportunity to buy much of Intel's fabs, and they concluded that shifting their process to match TSMCs would be cost prohibitive.

Because there’s many ways to raise capital, but very few ways to get talent.

You’re arguing about logistics under the current economic rules while simultaneously defending a change of rules.

When you put that on the table, then there’s a lot more ways to overcome the obstacles of today that aren’t being discussed.

If a company’s management becomes a risk to national interests, then giving them more money with no added oversight is not really solving anything.

Oh I agree that this may not be a solution.

Where I disagree is that if Intel fails, something better (US based) will replace them. It won't.

If we're already into the realm of the US government taking huge equity stakes and forming state corporations, maybe they could help form a new JV after a theoretical Intel failure. That's no less major a step to take.

In the scenario where Intel fails (which would primarily be centered around defaulting on the 50 billion of debt that they built up and can barely service), the US gov could offer strong tax incentives to players who want to form up a new national fab company. Give it favored status essentially (again, if the US is already crossing fairly extreme lines of having US state owned corporations, this doesn't seem so extreme in comparison).

You already have Private Equity interests that are starting to consume Intel. Ex: some of the new fabs are funded by Brookstone, and they have sold off a portion of the profit from the venture, and then collateralized the transaction with the hard assets and put Private Equity at the top of the bankruptcy cap stack.

I think that if the US gave some incentives, the pieces would fall into place extremely quickly. PE would do the actual capital funding in a heartbeat if they had sweetheart tax incentives, and Japan/SK/TSMC would also get involved. Presumably - given the style of the current admin - the "deal" would be "you get favored status by taking part in this project. We will give strong tax benefits to also drive profit. If you turn it down, expect to see tariffs and calls go unanswered while your competition has a direct line."

China taking Taiwan might finally force us to get our act together.