Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電) has reached an agreement with SBI Holdings Inc to jointly build a 12-inch fab in Japan to make chips for vehicles and artificial intelligence (AI) applications, the companies announced yesterday.
Powerchip is Taiwan’s third-largest contract chipmaker, after Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電). SBI is a Japanese financial services provider based in Tokyo.
Under the agreement, Powerchip and SBI will initially establish a preparatory company to select a site for the planned factory, formulate business plans and establish their funding strategies.
Photo courtesy of Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp
In a statement, Powerchip said the fab would make chips using legacy process technologies such as 22-nanometer or 28-nanometer, as well as more mature technologies.
“Our priority is Japan,” Powerchip chairman Frank Huang (黃崇仁) said, after signing the agreement with SBI chief executive officer Yoshitaka Kitao in Tokyo.
A weakening yen, lower labor costs and favorable financing now make Japan attractive as a production site, Huang said.
SBI said the new fab would aim to enhance semiconductor supply chain resilience in Japan as the issue of procuring sufficient chips — used in AI, automotive and other devices — has become critical amid heightened geopolitical risks.
“Powerchip will contribute to the stable supply of semiconductors in Japan and around the world by leveraging its expertise,” SBI said in a separate statement.
Details regarding the start of construction and operation of the plant will be announced when they become more clear, the companies said.
The partnership comes as Japan pledges to revive its semiconductor industry, after Tokyo launched its “Strategy for Semiconductors and the Digital Industry” in June 2021, SBI said.
“Partnering with Taiwan’s leading semiconductor company will be a major key to success,” SBI said.
While Japan is preparing billions of dollars in subsidies as part of a push to triple domestic chip production by 2030, such efforts are not enough, Kitao said.
“The government has spent ¥2 trillion (US$13.9 billion) over the past two years to develop domestic chip manufacturing capacity, but I think that’s too little,” Kitao said.
“We want to help revive Japan’s chip industry.” he said.
In the 1990s, Japan boasted a 50 percent share of the global semiconductor market, but its share in the global market has now dropped to less than 10 percent, SBI said. The global semiconductor market is expected to reach ¥100 trillion by 2030, the company said.
Additional reporting by Bloomberg
TECH BOOST: New TSMC wafer fabs in Arizona are to dramatically improve US advanced chip production, a report by market research firm TrendForce said With Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) pouring large funds into Arizona, the US is expected to see an improvement in its status to become the second-largest maker of advanced semiconductors in 2027, Taipei-based market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said in a report last week. TrendForce estimates the US would account for a 21 percent share in the global advanced integrated circuit (IC) production market by 2027, sharply up from the current 9 percent, as TSMC is investing US$65 billion to build three wafer fabs in Arizona, the report said. TrendForce defined the advanced chipmaking processes as the 7-nanometer process or more
China’s Huawei Technologies Co (華為) plans to start mass-producing its most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip in the first quarter of next year, even as it struggles to make enough chips due to US restrictions, two people familiar with the matter said. The telecoms conglomerate has sent samples of the Ascend 910C — its newest chip, meant to rival those made by US chipmaker Nvidia Corp — to some technology firms and started taking orders, the sources told Reuters. The 910C is being made by top Chinese contract chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯) on its N+2 process, but a lack
Who would not want a social media audience that grows without new content? During the three years she paused production of her short do-it-yourself (DIY) farmer’s lifestyle videos, Chinese vlogger Li Ziqi (李子柒), 34, has seen her YouTube subscribers increase to 20.2 million from about 14 million. While YouTube is banned in China, her fan base there — although not the size of YouTube’s MrBeast, who has 330 million subscribers — is close to 100 million across the country’s social media platforms Douyin (抖音), Sina Weibo (新浪微博) and Xiaohongshu (小紅書). When Li finally released new videos last week — ending what has
OPEN SCIENCE: International collaboration on math and science will persevere even if the incoming Trump administration imposes strict controls, Nvidia’s CEO said Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said on Saturday that global cooperation in technology would continue even if the incoming US administration imposes stricter export controls on advanced computing products. US president-elect Donald Trump, in his first term in office, imposed restrictions on the sale of US technology to China citing national security — a policy continued under US President Joe Biden. The curbs forced Nvidia, the world’s leading maker of chips used for artificial intelligence (AI) applications, to change its product lineup in China. The US chipmaking giant last week reported record-high quarterly revenue on the back of strong AI chip