Monday, February 1, 2021

Axios Login: Intel's manufacturing woes — Manchin targets Section 230 — Spotify's mood music

1 big thing: Why Intel's manufacturing woes should concern us all | Monday, February 01, 2021
 
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By Ina Fried ·Feb 01, 2021

Join Axios' Mike Allen and Ben Geman tomorrow at 12:30pm ET on corporate America's climate impact, featuring Microsoft chief environmental officer Lucas Joppa and Rockefeller Foundation president Rajiv J. Shah.

Today's Login is 1,283 words, a 5-minute read.

 
 
1 big thing: Why Intel's manufacturing woes should concern us all
Illustration of a man struggling to push a giant semiconductor up a rocky mountain.  

Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios

 

Intel, once known for using its chip manufacturing prowess to stay years ahead of the competition, now finds itself struggling to keep up. If the issues persist or worsen, it could follow the lead of most rivals who leave manufacturing entirely to partners.

Why it matters: Chips are some of the only strategic tech products that are actually manufactured in the U.S., accounting for a quarter-million U.S. jobs. They're also a small but key piece in the power struggle between the U.S. and China.

Driving the news: Intel is weighing just how much of its manufacturing could be handed off to a contract manufacturer even as it works to get its next-generation process up and running.

  • Costly delays are already handing a technical edge to rivals like AMD, which outsources its manufacturing to Taiwan's TSMC.
  • The percentage of chips made in the U.S. has already declined from 37% in 1990 to 12% today, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association, the trade group that represents U.S. chipmakers.

Policymakers and chip industry reps are now pleading for government intervention to keep what remains of U.S. chip manufacturing in the country.

The big picture: Beijing has grand designs on dominating the global chip market, which would in turn boost China's economic and technological might and could give the country an edge in A.I. and other next-generation technologies.

  • China's efforts have run into troubles of their own, but Intel falling behind will do the U.S. no favors.

Between the lines: For all the talk of how computers and smartphones should be made in the U.S., the practical reality is we have neither the infrastructure nor labor force nor economic setup to bring such manufacturing here.

  • Chips, on the other hand, are highly strategic, require a modest but well-paid labor force and are already made here.

What they're saying: Both Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin talked about the strategic importance of the U.S. chip industry in their confirmation hearings.

  • SIA head John Neuffer said in a statement to Axios, "Semiconductors are critical to our economy, national security, and future innovation."
  • "To strengthen America's semiconductor supply chains and keep our country on top in chip technology, leaders in Washington need to fully fund the semiconductor manufacturing incentives and research investments called for in the annual defense bill."

That bill — the most recent incarnation of the National Defense Authorization Act — has a provision that provides for federal incentives for domestic manufacturing and investments in semiconductor research.

  • However, those provisions still need to be funded now through congressional appropriations.

Be smart: The right government investment and incentives could encourage other firms to expand U.S. chipmaking and prevent an exodus of chip jobs even if Intel does reduce the amount of manufacturing it does in-house.

What's next: Pat Gelsinger, recently tapped to be Intel's new CEO, acknowledged on an earnings call last week that "it's likely that we will expand our use of external foundries for certain technologies and products."

  • But he maintained that he remains "confident that the majority of our 2023 products will be manufactured internally."
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2. Exclusive: Joe Manchin's bid to pierce tech's shield
An illustration of mouse cursors pointing at a shield.

Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios

 

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) is reviving his bipartisan bill that would add fresh carve-outs to tech's liability shield, Axios' Margaret Harding McGill reports. The bill would force online platforms to report opioid sales and other illegal activity on their websites to law enforcement.

Why it matters: As the 117th Congress shifts into gear, tech companies will again be fighting attempts by lawmakers of both parties to tweak or curb Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which shields website operators like Facebook or Reddit from liability over content their users post.

Details: Manchin and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) are announcing Monday they have reintroduced their "See Something, Say Something Online Act," which would add provisions to Section 230 requiring companies to report suspicious activity to law enforcement through a new clearinghouse within the Justice Department.

  • Companies must take "reasonable steps" to prevent or address illegal activity, and can be held liable if they fail to report it.

Yes, but: The tech industry has said the bill would put companies in the untenable position of trying to figure out what is and isn't evidence of a crime, which could lead to sharing user information with law enforcement to avoid liability.

The big picture: The bill is one of several whacks at Section 230 in the works on the Hill, with both Democrats and Republicans eager to make changes to the 1996 law to bring tech giants to heel.

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3. Spotify patents tech to suggest songs based on speech, emotion

Spotify was granted a patent for technology that aims to interpret users' speech and background noise to better curate the music it serves up, Axios Future's Bryan Walsh reports.

Why it matters: Aside from being a little weird and invasive, the technology is an example of a future trend in computing: emotion recognition.

What's happening: Music Business Worldwide reported this week that Spotify had filed in February 2018 and been granted this month a patent that uses "speech recognition to determine [users'] 'emotional state, gender, age, or accent' — attributes that can then be used to recommend content."

How it works: According to the patent filing, the company is developing technology that could extract "intonation, stress, rhythm, and the likes of units of speech" that would permit the "emotional state of a speaker to be detected and categorized."

  • Combined with other data from a user's listening history and past requests, appropriate music could then be recommended or played.

The catch: Technology companies often file patents for innovations that are never used in their products, and a company spokesperson told Pitchfork, "We don't have any news to share at this time."

What's next: Whether or not this capability ever makes it into Spotify, companies are increasingly exploring technology that purports to recognize emotional states through voice tone.

  • Amazon's new Halo fitness tracker analyzes users' vocal tone to evaluate how they're coming off to other people.
  • But there are concerns that emotion recognition could be misused — a report released this week from a U.K. human rights group identified dozens of companies in China using the technology, including some working with the police.
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A message from American Edge Project

Celebrating Black History Month
 
 

Did you know? Black businesses account for more than $138 billion in revenue each year. And America's tech innovation is driving minority entrepreneurship during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Read more from Harry C. Alford, President & CEO of The National Black Chamber of Commerce.

 
 
4. Seniors' vaccination woes create more heroes we shouldn't need

Bloomberg has a big feature that includes the story of Constance Else, who has been posting flyers across her New Jersey town offering to help older Americans who are struggling to book vaccination appointments online.

My thought bubble: While Else is rightly being praised, it should never have come to this.

The big picture: It's part of an all-too-familiar American story of individuals having to do heroic work to make up for a systemic shortfall, akin to 7-year-olds setting up lemonade stands to help pay medical bills or employees banding together to donate sick time to a seriously ill colleague.

  • A huge chunk of GoFundMe is this phenomenon writ large, as people turn to crowdsourcing to pay medical bills for those who lack sufficient insurance coverage.

And the problem, as the Bloomberg report details, is that there are more seniors struggling to get appointments than there have been heroes like Else to help them.

Be smart: Other countries aren't leaving individual citizens to fend for themselves.

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5. Take note

On Tap

Trading Places

  • Facebook has shifted its top U.S. policy executive — Republican Kevin Martin — to a new role overseeing global economic policy and is searching for a new executive to lead U.S. policy, according to an internal memo seen by Axios. (Facebook's top global policy executive — Joel Kaplan — remains in that post.)

ICYMI

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6. After you Login

People go to extraordinary lengths to recover their AirPods. Here's a recent example of an Arizona man who lowered a vacuum from his balcony to get back a pair that had fallen.

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A message from American Edge Project

Celebrating Black History Month
 
 

Did you know? Black businesses account for more than $138 billion in revenue each year. And America's tech innovation is driving minority entrepreneurship during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Read more from Harry C. Alford, President & CEO of The National Black Chamber of Commerce.

 
 

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