Technology

The Semiconductor Revolution

The Global Race for the Chip That Runs the WorldBy Rio Vale

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Length10h 32m

About this audiobook

The world runs on chips you’ve never seen, made in places most people have never considered — until they disappear. A handful of factories in Taiwan, South Korea, and the Netherlands produce virtually every advanced semiconductor on Earth. When COVID-19 fractured that delicate supply chain in 2020, auto plants across three continents went dark for lack of components costing a few dollars. When the United States imposed sweeping export controls on China in 2022, it triggered a geopolitical earthquake that permanently shifted the balance of global power. And as artificial intelligence devours ever-greater quantities of processing power, the race to control chip manufacturing has become the defining contest of our era.

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Audiobook details

GenreTechnology

Length10 hrs 32 mins

Narrated byListen with 1,000+ voices

FormateBook with Audio

Publish dateMay 6, 2026

LanguageEnglish

1Dedication

2Acknowledgments

3Chapter 1: The Flash That Changed Everything: Jack Kilby, Robert Noyce, and the Birth of the Integrated Circuit

4Chapter 2: The Traitorous Eight: Rebellion, Fairchild, and the Soul of Silicon Valley

5Chapter 3: Moore’s Law: The Most Important Prediction in Industrial History

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6Chapter 4: The Japanese Challenge: America’s First Semiconductor War

7Chapter 5: The Foundry Revolution: How Morris Chang Invented the Modern Chip Industry

8Chapter 6: The Light Fantastic: ASML and the Machine That Makes Everything

9Chapter 7: Taiwan’s Silicon Shield: TSMC and the Island at the Center of the World

10Chapter 8: South Korea’s Memory Empire: Samsung, SK Hynix, and the War for Memory

11Chapter 9: The GPU Age: Nvidia, Jensen Huang, and the Chip That Ignited the AI Revolution

12Chapter 10: The Fabless Revolution: How Qualcomm, Apple, and AMD Remade the Industry

13Chapter 11: The World Runs Dry: The 2020-2021 Global Chip Shortage

14Chapter 12: October 7th: America’s Declaration of Chip War on China

15Chapter 13: The Kirin Shock: Huawei’s Defiance and Beijing’s Billion-Dollar Gamble

16Chapter 14: Intel’s Reckoning: The Rise and Fall of a Chip Giant’s Industrial Strategy

17Chapter 15: The CHIPS Act: America Bets $52 Billion to Rebuild Its Silicon Heartland

18Chapter 16: Arizona Rising: TSMC’s American Gamble and the New Geography of Chipmaking

19Chapter 17: The Dutch at the Center: ASML, Export Leverage, and Europe’s Unexpected Power

20Chapter 18: Europe’s Industrial Awakening: The EU Chips Act and the Battle for Relevance

21Chapter 19: Japan’s Second Act: Rapidus and the Dream of Reclaiming Silicon Island

22Chapter 20: China’s Long Game: The Big Fund, SMIC, and the Road to Chipmaking Independence

23Chapter 21: The Sub-2nm Frontier: Gate-All-Around Transistors and the New Physics of Moore’s Law

24Chapter 22: AI’s Insatiable Hunger: Data Centers, HBM Memory, and the Energy Cost of Intelligence

25Chapter 23: The Weapons Connection: Semiconductors, Military Power, and the Technology of War

26Chapter 24: The Taiwan Question: War, Deterrence, and the Chip That Holds the World Hostage

27Chapter 25: The Reckoning: Who Will Win the Semiconductor Race?

28Character Guide

29References & Bibliography

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