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iewgnem

Captain
Registered Member
hifisnow said:
Why are these guys' tactics so crude?? Like I get they want to imitate what they think China did. But China get technical and management experience from gentle exposure in joint ventures and licensing agreement - backed up by lure of its huge market of course - not outright forced transfer...... It shows a lack of statecraft of European politicians really.
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Their tactics are crude because the tactics were invented based on their own propensity for theft to cope with what China's actually doing, e.g. long term investment in education and infrastructure, which aren't crude and as such can't be acknowledged. Once they convinced themselves that's what China's doing, and with theft being a fundamental Europeans attribute, stealing Chinese assets becomes the obvious choice.

It's good that they do so, because it's not in China's interest for the west to be competent.
 
T

tamsen_ikard

Captain
Registered Member
FairAndUnbiased said:
Nah if China plays super hardball ASML is done.

Supply side: Rare earth magnets are used for magnetic wafer stages, the only way to get vacuum compatible precision wafer movement. Screws aren't precise enough and generate particles, air stage isn't vacuum compatible. Laser for plasma excitation uses rare earth.

Demand side, invalidate all ASML patents in China.

DUV can also be crippled by banning neon, the only other major producer is Russia.
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Rare-earth is not lithography equipment that is super expensive and only a few items are sold per year. They are not even AI Chips, which are being smuggled by the 100s of thousands. For each ASML machine costing a few 100 million, you probably only need maybe 100 KG worth of Magnets. I am sure they will be able to source it, whether legally through some producers outside China or illegally through smuggling.


The rare-earth ban is mainly bad for large scale manufacturing industry. Chip production? Not so much. So, lets not get carried away about the Awesome superpower of the rare-earth controls. They are very impactful but not in these kinds of niche sectors.
 
BlackWindMnt

BlackWindMnt

Major
Registered Member
hifisnow said:
Why are these guys' tactics so crude?? Like I get they want to imitate what they think China did. But China get technical and management experience from gentle exposure in joint ventures and licensing agreement - backed up by lure of its huge market of course - not outright forced transfer...... It shows a lack of statecraft of European politicians really.
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Exactly this, why would China invest into the EU with all risk associated with those investments. While they can invest in countries like Vietnam, Indonesia, Pakistan, Philippines(when relationships improve), Thailand, India(when relationship improve) etc. Those are all close by countries, lower risk profiles to point it's all manageable and bigger markets as in more buyers.
 
FairAndUnbiased

FairAndUnbiased

Brigadier
Registered Member
tamsen_ikard said:
Rare-earth is not lithography equipment that is super expensive and only a few items are sold per year. They are not even AI Chips, which are being smuggled by the 100s of thousands. For each ASML machine costing a few 100 million, you probably only need maybe 100 KG worth of Magnets. I am sure they will be able to source it, whether legally through some producers outside China or illegally through smuggling.


The rare-earth ban is mainly bad for large scale manufacturing industry. Chip production? Not so much. So, lets not get carried away about the Awesome superpower of the rare-earth controls. They are very impactful but not in these kinds of niche sectors.
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Do you know how many magnetic wafer stage manufacturers there are and the cost of one? You can ask Chat GPT. These are among the most expensive parts of a EUV tool.

Let me give you an idea of how expensive they are.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

A 1 axis mechanical wafer stage costs 24k USD.

What do you think a 3 axis (minimum) vacuum compatible magnetic wafer stage costs?

100 kg of magnets - but it doesn't work without them. So what's the real value?
 
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tamsen_ikard

Captain
Registered Member
FairAndUnbiased said:
100 kg of magnets - but it doesn't work without them. So what's the real value?
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How much you need is the key right? Preventing smuggling or even legal purchase of thousand ton of Magnets is possible. But not if its 2-3 tons for the entire year that ASML might need. Moreover, ASML is likely not even buying these magnets directly, ASML is an assembler of other components/motors thing like that. ASML has thousands of suppliers and these suppliers are supplying to thousands of other applications. So, its not possible to target just ASML and say, don't sell this motor to ASML.

Even if China did a 100% ban of rare-earth exports to Netherlands, they still won't be able to prevent ASML production because of how little they need per machine and so few machines they make per year. Its not like cars which are produced by the millions.
 
G

gelgoog

Lieutenant General
Registered Member
Overbom said:
Desperate stuff by Trump. Galactic Supapowa now threatening China that it's going to produce its own cooking oil.
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The US produces soybeans but does not crush them to make oil. They sell them to China in bulk. So the US is paying China to crush their own soybeans to get oil.

Pretty pathetic.

Did you know India could buy soybean oil from the US but not the beans themselves? Coz those beans are GMO. Import into India is forbidden to prevent crop contamination but the oil would be fine.
Except the US cannot crush beans to extract oil. And India won't allow the import of whole beans to be crushed in their facilities.

tamsen_ikard said:
How much you need is the key right? Preventing smuggling or even legal purchase of thousand ton of Magnets is possible. But not if its 2-3 tons for the entire year that ASML might need. Moreover, ASML is likely not even buying these magnets directly, ASML is an assembler of other components/motors thing like that. ASML has thousands of suppliers and these suppliers are supplying to thousands of other applications. So, its not possible to target just ASML and say, don't sell this motor to ASML.
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I suspect most magnets by weight are for windmills and EVs. It is probably easy to redirect some material from those to ASML or the MIC. China needs to watch out.

tamsen_ikard said:
Even if China did a 100% ban of rare-earth exports to Netherlands, they still won't be able to prevent ASML production because of how little they need per machine and so few machines they make per year. Its not like cars which are produced by the millions.
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Likely, yes
 
I

iewgnem

Captain
Registered Member
Overbom said:
Desperate stuff by Trump. Galactic Supapowa now threatening China that it's going to produce its own cooking oil. Be very afraid!

View attachment 162549
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From Reddit:
China's oil imports in 2024 are as follows: Indonesia accounts for 65% of palm oil imports; Russia accounts for 54.7% of rapeseed oil imports; Russia accounts for 64.3% of sunflower oil imports; Brazil accounts for 59% of soybean imports; Canada accounts for 92% of rapeseed imports; and Russia accounts for 89% of flaxseed imports.

Reuters reported on September 28, 2024, that according to US government data, the United States imported approximately 1 million tons of waste cooking oil (commonly known as "gutter oil") in the first half of this year, of which approximately 60% came from China.
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Americans really have no cards left do they? lol
 
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