Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said that the construction of a planned 12-inch wafer plant in Kaohsiung would start later this year.
The chipmaker’s comments came after the Kaohsiung City Government invited the company to attend a groundbreaking ceremony on Sunday at the Nanzih Technology Industrial Park (楠梓科技產業園區), where the new plant is to be built.
The park would sit on the former site of a naphtha cracking plant owned by state-owned oil refiner CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油).
Photo courtesy of the Kaohsiung City Government Economic Development Bureau
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) yesterday did not confirm whether work on the Nanzih industrial park would begin on Sunday, but said it would start this month.
The city government said in a statement that TSMC’s presence in the industrial park is expected to help the city establish a semiconductor cluster within five years, which would boost high-end semiconductor technology development and cultivate a talent pool for the industry.
The semiconductor supply chain in Kaohsiung is expected to create more than 45,000 jobs, and speed up the pace of development not only in the manufacturing sector, but also in the service and commercial sectors, it said.
The world’s largest contract chipmaker unveiled its plans for the Kaohsiung plant in November last year.
The plant is to use the advanced 7-nanometer process and the mature 28-nanometer process to produce chips, with production scheduled to begin in 2024.
Chips made using the 7-nanometer process are expected to be used in emerging technologies such as high-performance computing devices, while chips made with the 28-nanometer process would likely be destined for automotive electronic applications, analysts said.
While TSMC has not disclosed any financial terms for the new facility, analysts said it could cost NT$200 billion to NT$300 billion (US$6.67 billion to US$10 billion).
The proposed plant passed an environmental impact assessment in April. It is expected to create 1,500 jobs, with an annual production value of NT$157.6 billion.
The city government said that since Chen assumed the post of Kaohsiung mayor in August 2020 after winning a by-election, the city had as of the end of April attracted NT$498.1 billion in investments.
Other major technology companies, such as Win Semiconductors Corp (穩懋半導體) and Germany-based Merck Group, have pledged to invest in Kaohsiung.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said that its investment plan in Arizona is going according to schedule, following a local media report claiming that the company is planning to break ground on its third wafer fab in the US in June. In a statement, TSMC said it does not comment on market speculation, but that its investments in Arizona are proceeding well. TSMC is investing more than US$65 billion in Arizona to build three advanced wafer fabs. The first one has started production using the 4-nanometer (nm) process, while the second one would start mass production using the
A TAIWAN DEAL: TSMC is in early talks to fully operate Intel’s US semiconductor factories in a deal first raised by Trump officials, but Intel’s interest is uncertain Broadcom Inc has had informal talks with its advisers about making a bid for Intel Corp’s chip-design and marketing business, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter. Nothing has been submitted to Intel and Broadcom could decide not to pursue a deal, according to the Journal. Bloomberg News earlier reported that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is in early talks for a controlling stake in Intel’s factories at the request of officials at US President Donald Trump’s administration, as the president looks to boost US manufacturing and maintain the country’s leadership in critical technologies. Trump officials raised the
‘SILVER LINING’: Although the news caused TSMC to fall on the local market, an analyst said that as tariffs are not set to go into effect until April, there is still time for negotiations US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that he would likely impose tariffs on semiconductor, automobile and pharmaceutical imports of about 25 percent, with an announcement coming as soon as April 2 in a move that would represent a dramatic widening of the US leader’s trade war. “I probably will tell you that on April 2, but it’ll be in the neighborhood of 25 percent,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago club when asked about his plan for auto tariffs. Asked about similar levies on pharmaceutical drugs and semiconductors, the president said that “it’ll be 25 percent and higher, and it’ll
CHIP BOOM: Revenue for the semiconductor industry is set to reach US$1 trillion by 2032, opening up opportunities for the chip pacakging and testing company, it said ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光投控), the world’s largest provider of outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) services, yesterday launched a new advanced manufacturing facility in Penang, Malaysia, aiming to meet growing demand for emerging technologies such as generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications. The US$300 million facility is a critical step in expanding ASE’s global footprint, offering an alternative for customers from the US, Europe, Japan, South Korea and China to assemble and test chips outside of Taiwan amid efforts to diversify supply chains. The plant, the company’s fifth in Malaysia, is part of a strategic expansion plan that would more than triple
RSS