Asianometry

26 Apr 2022 • 2 minute read

If you like to take the semiconductor and EDA industries in video form, then one of my favorite YouTube channels is Asianometry. I contacted Jon V who creates the videos to find out a bit more about him beyond the fact that he lives in Taiwan. For some reason, I thought he lived in the south of the island, but he lives in Taipei.

But he's not always lived there. He grew up in Anaheim (Southern California, think Disneyland) and went to university in the Bay Area. He studied finance and business before entering the tech industry. Then came his big transition. As he told me:

After working there for about ten years, I bummed around for a few months and on a whim decided to move to Asia. I interviewed with four companies in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Singapore. Taiwan gave me the best offer, and there I went. I had no idea I would stay here for so long!

He has been living in Taiwan for 6 years and counting since he got fed up with "running financial models and thinking about valuation." If you watch the videos, you will discover he has made himself pretty knowledgeable about the semiconductor ecosystem, much of which he has learned from industry professionals he has met.

He is not a full-time YouTuber. In his day job, he works for a startup that is still in stealth mode, so he cannot say much, providing AI services for a specific type of customer. But he can't say more than that.

Oh, and that deer he uses as an avatar?

The picture is of a Sika Deer from Nara, Japan. There is no reason for the picture. YouTube asked for a channel profile picture and I picked something cute from my latest trip abroad.

I asked him how he does research on topics:

Research is a long and tiring process. It takes up the majority of my time. You start with papers, slide decks, lectures, YouTube, textbooks and the like. Then you read until things start repeating themselves. Then you sit down and write out a script before you forget it all. It really is like being back at university.

Videos

I asked him to pick 3 or 4 of his videos as a sort of "best of." He does videos on other topics than semiconductors sometimes, often with a financial angle (such as the financial crisis in Sri Lanka, or why so many retired South Koreans live in poverty).

A look at the design gap and functional verification in particular: