The pandemic highlighted the vulnerability of global supply chains, spurring countries and companies to reshape them for a new era of global trade, according to new research by Goldman Sachs.

However, based on trade flows, evidence of global change might be less pronounced than expected. Commenting on this, Goldman Sachs Research chief Asia-Pacific economist, Andrew Tilton, said: “If we look across trends in trade, investment, immigration and so on, we really don’t see a consistent story across the board in terms of deglobalisation.

“In many areas, like data flows, we’re actually seeing acceleration in globalization,” he says. “With the more traditional areas, goods trade and capital flows, we’re seeing a slowing down, we’d say, in the rate of globalization — but not a widespread reversal.”

That said, a broader push to reshore supply chains is creating investment opportunities, Goldman Sachs asset management team member Luke Barrs explains.

Barrs said: “The push to domestic supply chains, to build greater security in supply chains, and especially critical technology and resources actually is one of the biggest drivers of potential demand in growth that we’re likely to see across the public equity landscape.”

On the other hand, Marvell Technology board chairman, Richard Hill, doesn’t see a significant reshaping of the global semiconductor supply chain on the horizon, even if investment flows are shifting in the industry. For one, he has said that that the subsidies in the U.S. CHIPS and Science Act — intended to revitalise U.S. semiconductor manufacturing — are only a “drop in the bucket” compared to what would be required to build a domestic industry on the scale required to meet the U.S.’s needs.

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Commenting on this, Hill said: “In the United States, we have let our most important asset atrophy. And that’s the education of our population. Semiconductors is not making steel. It’s not a physical prowess business. It’s an intellectual business.”