TSMC (Lincoln) vs Samsung (Clinton) vs Intel (Washington)

By SemiWiki

February 28, 2013

Usually I sleep on long flights, if not, I watch movies and read. The Lincoln movie was playing on EVA Air this week which reminded me that Abraham Lincoln was one of the greatest U.S. Presidents. If I was asked to pick a U.S. President as a spokesperson for TSMC it would be Honest Abe Lincoln. Chairman Morris Chang said it best during his keynote, "We do not screw customers!" Samsung, on the other hand, chose Bill Clinton for their CES keynote which is also a good fit in my opinion (Clinton was impeached for lying and cheating but he is still a very popular President). For Intel I would choose George Washington, our founding father of microprocessors and GLOBALFOUNDRIES would be Barack Obama.

Associating with an American President is certainly good business since the U.S. market is the largest and Western culture is often emulated. Unfortunately honesty and decency is not always the top business priority in competitive markets so Abe Lincoln for a CES keynote would be a tough sell. Even with the incredible amount of intellectual property contained in semiconductors and consumer electronics, trust does not seem to be a prevailing factor.

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