Geoffrey Manne on Semiconductor Competition and the Economics of Moore’s Law
ICLE President Geoffrey A. Manne is quoted in this American Economic Association article on research about competition in semiconductor. It explains that keeping pace with Moore’s law and the rising cost of advanced chip fabs forces firms into repeated, high-stakes races that sustain rivalry even in a concentrated industry. Read the full article here.
Brian Albrecht, Geoffrey A. Manne, David Teece, and Mario A. Zúñiga discuss “From Moore’s Law to Market Rivalry: The Economic Forces That Shape the Semiconductor Manufacturing Industry” (International Center for Law & Economics, November 12, 2025, https://laweconcenter.org/resources/from-moores-law-to-market-rivalry-the-economic-forces-that-shape-the-semiconductor-manufacturing-industry/).
“Two unique, interconnected technological imperatives define semiconductor manufacturing competition. Moore’s Law began as a rule of thumb about transistor counts doubling at a steady cadence. Today its practical meaning is broader: customers expect predictable gains in overall performance per watt and per dollar, and delivered on schedule. That pushes the industry through a relentless metronome of “beats,” where each node (manufacturing generation) must arrive on time with real, measurable gains. Falling behind by a single beat can cost customers for years. Rock’s Law is the darker side of Moore’s Law. It holds that, as chips get denser, the cost of making them rises exponentially. Advanced fabs now cost $10–20 billion, and a single high-NA EUV scanner (the heart of leading-edge lithography) runs north of $400 million. These are not scale or inflation artifacts; they’re the price of pushing matter toward the level of atomic precision demanded by Moore’s Law. Together, these forces create recurring, high-stakes races unmatched by any other market in the world. In these races, firms must commit massive resources years in advance, under extreme uncertainty.”