Commentary on X
@ramez China leads in most tech areas and does not waste money fighting endless wars…USA is run by old non-tech folks
1:57 PM · Jul 14, 2026On EVs, some benefit to China 5-10 years ago. Not in the last few years in which Chinese companies have gained the advantage. On solar, it went the other way. Tesla / SolarCity was never a major solar manufacturer or a big customer. Tesla PV manufacturing efforts struggled, so they shifted to buying Chinese panels. Germany was an important customer, though. Chinese solar manufacturing really started in response to German solar subsidies and the booming German market. No shortage of customers in compute. And China can and is doing teardowns of ASML machines. Physical process is the main advantage US companies have right now, and that's something China is adept at catching up on. Software won't remain a barrier. One-time software moats like CUDA aren't anymore, and export controls are just accelerating that.
3:28 PM · Jul 14, 2026If you want the US to stay in the lead in semi-conductors and AI and regain the lead in other high tech sectors, then trying to slow down China is a rearguard action at best, and likely futile. The key steps needed are to *speed up innovation and execution in the US*.
China produces solar, batteries, EVs, nuclear power, & robots at a lower cost, higher volume, & often higher quality than the US. It's naive to think they won't catch and surpass the US on GPUs and AI compute. Export restrictions can only slow China's AI efforts temporarily.
@ramez My point was how they got started. I also think the US market knowledge with Solar as a customer and pushing like roof panels was a positive assist. Much of the argument around tech mfg and the moat China has boils down to US investment and being a client pushing the learning.
3:38 PM · Jul 14, 2026View all
China produces solar, batteries, EVs, nuclear power, & robots at a lower cost, higher volume, & often higher quality than the US. It's naive to think they won't catch and surpass the US on GPUs and AI compute. Export restrictions can only slow China's AI efforts temporarily.
1:45 PM · Jul 14, 2026@ramez Tesla, Tesla Solar, etc helped with IP quite a bit both intentionally via patent freedom and as a customer of panels and not via pure IP theft. AI compute is more difficult to steal as is the software layer, and no one helping.
3:03 PM · Jul 14, 2026