SEMICONDUCTORS are the epicentre of artificial intelligence (AI). The Internet of Things (IoT), 5G mobile and cloud computing, chips are the critical component of the digital economy and are only becoming more vital and valuable with accelerating profit pools.

For investors, that means understanding exactly what the 5G war means to the world and how it will reshape the global balance of power. The US-China differences are over critical metal because it is crucial to winning the 5G war.

The metal is cesium (Cs), the most active metal on earth and it’s so rare that it’s hard even to put a price on it. It’s also a vital ingredient in our ability to make 5G happen. Cesium could mean the difference between real-time responsiveness and 5G failure. It is the ‘Cesium Standard” that allows us to measure time accurately. That means it’s the key to mobile networks, the internet, and global positioning systems (GPS).

There are six labs around the world that calculate coordinated universal time — the world’s official time. The cesium atomic clock measures the nuclear vibrations of atoms. This clock ticks at nine billon times per second. That’s one ten millionth of a nanosecond frequency or time interval out of almost sixteen digits.

Why is it important to measure time or frequency so accurately for practical systems like GPS or 5G?

We understand this with the GPS system, which is fundamentally a time-keeping system and so what we do is we put atomic clocks on satellites to make sure that they are all synchronised and stand on the surface of the earth with our GPS receiver.

It gets time signals from each of those satellites and it just measures the signals arrival times. It absolutely depends on having time at the nanosecond level because if we don’t have time at the nanosecond level than we cannot tell which satellite we are closer to.

Cesium was only added to the United States’ list of critical minerals in 2018 despite the fact that it will be a factor in the 5G revolution --a revolution that will generate trillions of dollars in new products along the way. This time America still has a major cesium problem, while China holds all the critical metals power. There are only three mines in the world that can produce cesium, — Tanco in Manitoba, Bitika in Zimbabwe and Sinclair in Australia. Two of them, Tanco and Bitika, are no longer producing and the stockpiles at Tanco and Sinclair are largely controlled by China.

Cesium’s applications in the 5G war and in measuring time make it the stuff of critical metal legend and a valuable weapon in the race for technological dominance.

The trouble is China is thinking exactly along the same lines.

Farhan Ahmed
Karachi

Published in Dawn, June 25th, 2020