Apple, Qualcomm tried to purchase exclusive access to TSMC chip production | TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

From TUAW:

Each company proposed investing more than US$1 billion in order to have TSMC set aside chip production capacity exclusively for them.

I know Tim Cook is a very bright guy and that he has an extremely competent leadership team, but I can’t help wonder why Apple hasn’t decided to build their own chip fab plant in the US? Since chipmaking is almost completely automated, it can’t be because of labor costs. And if not labor costs, then what? Is it lack of cash? (Heh…)