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Comment by state_less | Hacker News Reader

An industry doesn't need to increase supply when demand increases, they can absorb the demand as profits. More so in an industry that is hard to enter into. Consumers hate this and call it all sorts of things like market failure, gouging, etc... In this case, the suppliers are slow walking increases in production and enjoying a run up in profits. They raise concerns about oversupply, as if this deep learning thing were some passing fad and the market will have no use for the new supply if it passes. It's a dubious notion though, the demand is here to stay and new supply needs to come online to meet demand. We simply need more silicon in the market. High prices should eventually bring new supply online, but I'm a little disappointed by the rate of the ramp up.

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>It's a dubious notion though, the demand is here to stay and new supply needs to come online to meet demand.

This is a big bet. Look at what happened in 2001 with the dot-com boom. We're still trading on their dark fiber over-build today. Meanwhile any overcapacity built in fabs will quickly be made obsolete by newer and better fab technology (or at least, that's been the pattern for the past 30 years).

I think you're missing the fact that building new supply takes time and sustained commitment, and there's simply nobody in a good position to make that commitment without losing big if your thesis turns out to be wrong.

If the demand for new AI builds is eventually satisfied, or worse, craters overnight, then who will be left holding the bag? It sure won't be Google or Apple, or even NVIDIA - it will be TSMC and Samsung.

But as you mention, this is all temporary. Either you're right, and demand will remain sustained long enough for some of the providers to decide to take that risk, or demand will crater and prices will fall.

The fact that the S&P 500 is near record highs at the same time as consumer confidence is at a 70 year low is not encouraging for continued all steam ahead in my mind... but then it's easy to predict a general future recession, and much harder to predict it to the day.

The idea that we're still trading dark fiber from 2001 is an old narrative right? I guess it is still floating around. But, we're in a second big fiber build out for not only residential, but also to connect all these new data centers. Could there be some demand oscillation for silicon? Sure, but overall deep learning is not some passing fad even if someone gets too far out over their skis and over buys. So far Big Tech has increased spend 3 years in a row and next year they'll spend more than this year. Demand has evidently not let up for AI services, we still need more silicon.

I doubt consumers will regret these compute purchases in 3 years, my 3 year old GPU is still holding value, actually increased in value, and I use it more now than ever.

I did predict or expect that if oil went to $150 we'd be in recession territory, currently hovering below that level and folks are feeling the squeeze and aren't happy. Things could get worse or better, tough to tell, but I think silicon demand is more or less secular and will do relatively well in a variety of macro conditions.

The dark fiber from the dotcom era is approaching the end of its life expectancy. Contracts for leasing dark strands reflected that. Most of it likely still has useful life left that the owners will want to monetize but it might change how it is used.

> too far out over their skis

Bad metaphor. Not being forward enough is a common mistake. When learning, you may want to make yourself _feel_ like you're too far forward. We can commonly think we're too far forward when actually overall we're still too far back. Teaching it is very hard.

Although it is dependent on your style of skis (e.g. carving) and style of skiing (powder, racing, cruising).

For me, it is very rare that I go too far forward (I began with a leant back style and I haven't rectified that after many years of skiing). I try to prioritise fun over ability.

This seems like it would be easy to structurally solve - big tech could make strategic partnerships with 5 to 10 year horizons with the very fabs in question. If they promised to spend a flat or growing $X on silicon (without easy contract cancellation) over the next decade, then the risk would be entirely on the tech companies and not on the fab companies. Of course, there's always bankruptcy to worry about, but that's less of a threat for Google and Apple than it is for OpenAI or NVIDIA.

The fact that we _haven't_ seen such deals be made, and that ~50% of new datacenter builds have been quietly cancelled[1], suggests to me that we're dealing with paper demand more than true sustained demand.

1: https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/artificial-intell...

> the suppliers are slow walking increases in production and enjoying a run up in profits

The major companies have been trying to build >$100B of new production capacity in the US for years now. All of these manufacturing facilities have been significantly delayed by NIMBYs using the same "environmental and community concerns" advocacy slop that hinders almost all productive industry in the US.

Blaming the suppliers is a lazy take. They aren't responsible for degrowth activists being able to dictate what we are allowed to build.

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