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FA Confidential by Riko Radojcic
About the Book
A hard science techno-thriller set in the new reality of global competition for semiconductor dominance, where few decisions bring the world to a brink of conflict…
Jane’s appointment as the National Security Adviser gives her an opportunity to make a real difference. She uses her influence to champion subsidies for American semiconductor manufacturers because access to microelectronic chips is a strategic imperative. Her career rests on their success…
On the other end of the world, Argon Zhi, an executive at a semiconductor foundry, crafts a plan for continued competitiveness of the tech sector in the face of changing economic environment. He feels that this is his duty because he wants to ensure the safety of his nation…
The ensuing events result in a puzzle that Cedric loves. He is a tinkerer who ‘plays’ in his Failure Analyses lab to figure out why some chips do not work the way they are supposed to. He notices a pattern and like a detective on a murder case with no obvious suspects, he follows the clues and uncovers a shocking truth that leads to progressively more dangerous international situation…
A seemingly unrelated random murder in Arizona brings everything to a head …
Background
COVID pandemic of 2020-2022 has exposed weaknesses in many supply chains – from masks and gloves to various drugs and so on. This has led to a significant injection of nationalism into the globalized economic system and many countries – and many politicians – have rushed to call for domestic production of things that were perceived to be critical. This was very much so also in the semiconductor supply chain – especially during the chip supply bottle-necks that followed the pandemic, and that trickled down to shortages of new cars and other high tech products. The US, the EU, China and many other countries have therefore pushed through legislation to stimulate ‘on-shoring’ chip supply chain – and especially chip manufacturing. Many billions of dollars have been committed and for once terms like ‘semiconductors’ or ‘chips’ or ‘fabs’ have entered the popular domain.
This made me ponder about who might be motivated to slow down this rush to build new chip manufacturing facilities in America, and how would one go about handicapping one of those fabs – short of just blowing something up. Too crude and too obvious. Which in turn made me think about some of the un-sung heroes of the semiconductor technology – Failure Analyses Engineers, who routinely use their mind-blowing tools and techniques to ferret out seemingly fantastical root causes of failures in chips.
On an entirely separate thread, I was also thinking that it was time to have a protagonist that was not of Yugoslav origins – unlike in my previous novels. I picked North England, where I went to college and obtained my EE degrees.
So, governments involved in high tech, little bit of ‘cheating in an international race for chip manufacturing, a touch of insight into how failure analyses of chips is done, and out came this story…
Details
Formats: Paperback and eBook
Date of Publication: Mar 2023
Publisher Open Books Open Books – Publisher – About Us (open-bks.com)
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Where to Buy: Open Books: FA Confidential by Riko Radojcic | Open Books