
ARM: Can 'crown jewel' of UK technology be protected? - headalgorithm
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54144434
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klelatti
The irony in all this is that a government that says it wants to create a
'trillion dollar tech giant' has no idea what to do with the one world leading
tech company that is based in the UK.

[1]
[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2020/09/11/cummings-p...](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2020/09/11/cummings-
plan-create-uk-trillionaire-tech-giant-admirable/)

~~~
Rexxar
> Cummings suggested that a no-deal Brexit could allow the Government to offer
> state aid to the country’s most promising technology businesses

The second level irony is that it's the UK that has always been the main
opponent to every state subsidies while they were in European union.

~~~
klelatti
Third level irony: UK tech sector wants freedom of movement across the EU and
would rather not have state aid.

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petercooper
I've been doing a lot of thinking out loud today about the UK's lamentable
state with regards to its technology industry today without much disagreement
in my back channels – perhaps HN will have more interesting things to say?

It feels like the UK's failings in the technology space are entirely cultural.
Looking back at the 70s and 80s when the UK punched above its weight in the
microcomputer space, UK tech companies remained very insular and the people
who got rich tended to just retire or move on to other industries. This seems
to happen wave after wave in the UK. The big names of any decade are no longer
around in the next one because they got rich and quit.

The US seems to have a culture of building up business communities in a way
the UK doesn't through investment and people _staying in the game_ for
multiple decades. There are _thousands_ of paper multi-millionaires who
continue to work 40 hour weeks in the US in a way you'd never see in the UK.
It's also far less common in the UK for people who got rich off tech to
reinvest back into the nascent companies in their space rather than retire.
And who's giving multi millions to CS institutions like Imperial or St Andrews
in the same way US billionaires do to Stanford and MIT? Where are the
charismatic titans of UK technology?

Maybe I'm being unfair, but I can't put my finger on any of it with any
clarity because I don't have my head in the UK tech space too much (I live
here but virtually "work in the US", so maybe I'm part of the problem) but
something smells funny about British culture when it comes to tech and I'd
love to know what the cause of that smell _is_.

The UK is certainly capable of great things. We've seen this in the
biomedical, pharma, finance, and energy spaces – how can we be punching above
our weight in sectors like those but still have most of our population
flocking to American sites like Reddit, Facebook, and Instagram because the
local alternatives either don't exist or are terrible?

~~~
ksec
>It feels like the UK's failings in the technology space are entirely
cultural.

Yes, It is cultural. And I think It is more than what you described, Although
I may be over generalising it a bit.

If you look at the US, all of the large tech companies, or in fact _any_ big
companies, not just tech all have the same mentality. _Rule_ the world.
Whether that is Finance, Energy, Food, Tech. The home market US was merely a
testing ground, they always had an eye on the _world_. They are greedy, pushy,
willing to go the extra miles to close the deal. The sales forces between US,
UK and Continental Europe are very different. Where in UK and EU there are
more towards making both party happy. US tends to be ruthless.

US tech communities and companies also has a rather strange workaholic
culture. Where employees are expected to put in the extra hours. But of course
the pay in US is also a lot better. It also gives the idea that if you wanted
money, go to US, or even working in a US company in the UK, or remote. Most UK
/ EU tech companies are not salary competitive.

Management Style is also different. Which also mean the working environment in
tech also flavours US companies. Some of what is common in US is against the
norm in UK. This matter in Tech because the space is moving way too fast.
Innovation Efficiency is the key. Before you could gasp the basic of one thing
you already have to learn another. Compared to other industry you mentioned
which tend to have a slower pace, even in finance. what you learned dont
change that often. Only the Data changed.

Not to mention the Brits culturally aren't very good at marketing. Something
the US is exceptionally good at.

~~~
detritus
> Not to mention the Brits culturally aren't very good at marketing. Something
> the US is exceptionally good at.

Strange to hear this - I've always thought that the UK was particularly good
at marketing, [English-speaking] world-leading, in fact. The creative aspect
at least. Perhaps I'm conflating this with advertising.

~~~
jariel
Good point on differentiating ads and marketing.

UK have some of the best 'communications culture' in the world, which lends to
agency style stuff.

Marketing, particularly product marketing, is somewhat different. I would
still say pretty good though.

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LatteLazy
I'm very confused. We sold this to the Japanese already!

~~~
tyingq
Yeah, I'm confused as well. SoftBank could have done things the UK didn't
like. They've owned ARM since mid 2016.

~~~
dageshi
Probably a couple reasons why it's coming up now. First the Japanese have a
pretty good reputation as owners of UK businesses, they own quite a few Scotch
distilleries and impressions are they manage things well.

Second, I think the world feels a lot more protectionist nowadays vs when the
original buyout happened. I know it wasn't that long ago but the trade war
tariffs between the US and China sort of set the tone.

~~~
toyg
The level of anxiety about capital and industrial flight in the UK is also
much higher due to Brexit.

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Hokusai
> but conversations on whether to impose them or what they might be have not
> even started.

Sorry for the cheap shot, but the current government is not very good at
starting conversations, signing agreements or to to keep them.

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brian_herman__
Hasn't the ship already sailed? It was sold to softbank and now NVidia? It
seems a too late for this.

edit: Get rid of little to late and change to too late.

~~~
archgoon
Apparently; when ARM was first sold to Softbank, Softbank made several
guarantees to the UK. Nvidia has made no agreement to continue those
guarantees.

> At that time, Softbank announced it had agreed to legally binding
> commitments to increase investment, headcount and preserve its headquarters
> in the UK.

> It is not too late for the government to impose conditions, but
> conversations on whether to impose them or what they might be have not even
> started.

~~~
OJFord
I would assume Nvidia bought (by obligation) those commitments too?

Otherwise it would be pointless having them in the first place, you'd just get
out of it (if you wanted to) with some creative corporate governance.

[I used to work at Arm, but not on creative corporate governance.]

~~~
toyg
Uhm, no...? The obligation was on Softbank, not on ARM.

 _> you'd just get out of it (if you wanted to) with some creative corporate
governance_

... aand you've just "discovered" how large companies routinely get out of
their commitments to politicians.

~~~
jlokier
> The obligation was on Softbank, not on ARM

Plausibly the obligation on Softbank could require them, when selling, to
require the new buyer agree to the same obligation.

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scruffyherder
If arm wanted to stay in the uk they shouldn’t have sold themselves to the
Japanese.

The UK has always lagged in tech as they still think it’s the 1800’s and their
domestic island is enough as they ignored the world in the 80s with low effort
3rd party sourcing at best.

As usual the state TV and education could have dominated the English speaking
world with BBC micros and education, but again they stayed on their tiny
insignificant island.

This whole thing is nothing more than sellers re-remorse for selling ARM for
next to nothing.

Go and do something new.

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merrvk
Who needs ARM when you have solid investments in companies like OneWeb

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nickik
I hope your joking

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Spooky23
A: No.

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fluffything
Of course it can?

Just buy it from Softbank at over 40bn$.

"It's as simple as that".

What the choosing beggars want, however, is getting ARM back from Softbank for
free. After Softbank paid 32bn$ for it. And there you are right, ain't gonna
happen.

~~~
primrose
I'm not so sure UK politicians would know what to do with a complicated tech
company.

~~~
dimitrios1
The answer is leave it the f___ alone. Why do people think politicians _need_
to do anything?

~~~
sasum
Because we live in a world where governments use their power to prop up
certain companies, giving them a competitive advantage.

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tus88
Isn't apple about to design their own cpu? I would be selling arm asap.

~~~
eyesee
Apple has been designing their own CPU's for a decade, using the ARM ISA.
Apple has a perpetual license to the ISA though, so they would not be a source
of future revenue.

Apple is also under no obligation to stick with ARM's roadmap for future
products.

~~~
giancarlostoro
This is something I have wondered about and had no idea they basically had
some sort of perpetual license. Is this normal for ARM to give out such a
license? Or are all ARM licenses basically typically under those conditions? I
know ARM mostly just licenses specs to their chips.

~~~
jannes
ARM is a joint venture that Apple started with Acorn and VLSI.

Article from 1990: [https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-
xpm-1990-11-28-fi-4993-s...](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-
xpm-1990-11-28-fi-4993-story.html)

~~~
giancarlostoro
Wow I had no idea, now a lot of things make more sense to me about why Apple
is going the route they are. I honestly wish them nothing but success. Part of
me hopes they license their own chips down the line. The Intel monopoly over
desktop systems needs to end.

~~~
unionpivo
Not under current market.

Apple got as big as it is by vertically integrating everything and creating
walled gardens.

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sys_64738
Why is government interfering with private enterprise? The UK gov't always
does this.

