#632 – Steve Sanghi – Microchip CEO for 31 Years!

The Amp Hour Electronics Podcast

Dave talks with Steve Sanghi who was Microchip CEO for 31 years, now Executive Chair.

Check out his new book, Up and to the Right. How Microchip was built into one of the biggest and most pofitable chip companies in the world.

In this episode we discussed:

• The early microcontrollers, ROM, EPROM, EEPROM, FLASH
• Semiconductor Fab’s and locations
• How the US Government CHIPS act is a golden handcuffs trap
• US/China rhetoric
• What really happened durign the covid supply chain crisis
• How 90% of medical devices use Microchip parts
• Lead times
• Respect for the chip manufacturers and supply chains
• Just-In-Time becomes Just-In-Case
• How the Toyota production system works and how it had to change
• The impacts of a potential war in Taiwan
• How does it make sense to make thousands of part variants?
• The secret to making part varients
• Why Microchip chose MIPS vs ARM
• Atmel didn’t make any money!
• Pricing discipline
• How buying Atmel almost didn’t happen, and how Dialog Semiconductor goofed it
• Draconian NDA terms
• Atmel was bloated
• RISC-V plans
• Customer Driven Obsolescence
• Foundry vs In-House limitations
• Open Source FPGA tools?
• Third party tool support
• Why not offer free optimised compilers?
• It’s all about black swan events, down cycles, pointy haired bosses, and how All your Cost Bases Beyong To Me
• Hobbyist vs professionals
• How Microchip is the largest aerospace chip maker in the world. Nothing leaves earth without a Microchip part in it.
• Radiation hardended parts
• Market value profitability
• Will Microchip ever get acquired
• Strained US vs China relations