Tokyo Electron Ltd is seeking to build a team of chip engineers in India to take advantage of the push by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government for more semiconductor manufacturing in the world’s most populous country.
Japan’s biggest chip equipment maker plans to hire and train local engineers in or around 2026, with their first task to provide technical services to Tata Electronics Pvt, Tokyo Electron chief executive officer Toshiki Kawai said.
Robotics would play a growing role and local staff would be provided with in-person and remote support from Japan, he added, declining to specify how many people the company would need to hire.
Photo: Bloomberg
India is amping up efforts to attract international electronics companies and chipmakers to set up facilities within its borders, under a plan by the Modi administration to close the tech gap with advanced economies.
Apple Inc is accelerating its production and sales of iPhones in the country, while Tata Group and others are investing billions of dollars in semiconductor fabrication plants.
The government is providing incentives to support those ventures, which would need machinery and know-how from companies like Tokyo Electron.
The Tokyo-based company has set a target of 10,000 new hires globally over the next five years, as more countries race to build chips at home. Tokyo Electron supplies equipment to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電), Samsung Electronics Co, SK Hynix Inc and Intel Corp, and its forecast for the business year to March points to record revenue and operating profit.
It also expects overall chip demand to double by 2030, boosted by artificial intelligence, autonomous cars and a push toward energy efficiency and decarbonization.
That is even as the US pressures Japan to further tighten restrictions on exports of advanced chipmaking gear to China, part of an extended effort to curb its technological progress.
US officials have sought to limit Tokyo Electron’s ability to service some of its machines in China and have talked of invoking the foreign direct product rule, which allows Washington to control sales of products made anywhere in the world if they use even a small amount of US technology.
Such moves would not affect global appetite for chipmaking machines, 61-year-old Kawai said.
“The importance of semiconductors remains unchanged. There will always be investment somewhere,” he said.
Tokyo Electron said earlier this month it would help train Tata Electronics’ workforce on chip-making equipment and support its research and development.
Modi’s administration has so far approved more than US$15 billion of semiconductor investments, including US memorychip maker Micron Technology Inc’s plan for a US$2.75 billion assembly facility.
Israel’s Tower Semiconductor Ltd is also seeking to partner with Indian billionaire Gautam Adani on a US$10 billion fabrication plant in western India.
Sales to China, which surged to about 50 percent of Tokyo Electron’s revenue in the June quarter, would likely fall to less than 40 percent in October-March, and comprise about 25 percent to 30 percent in the future as overall sales of equipment rise, Kawai said.
“India won’t replace the Chinese market. It would be growth in addition to China,” he said.
MULTIFACETED: A task force has analyzed possible scenarios and created responses to assist domestic industries in dealing with US tariffs, the economics minister said The Executive Yuan is tomorrow to announce countermeasures to US President Donald Trump’s planned reciprocal tariffs, although the details of the plan would not be made public until Monday next week, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. The Cabinet established an economic and trade task force in November last year to deal with US trade and tariff related issues, Kuo told reporters outside the legislature in Taipei. The task force has been analyzing and evaluating all kinds of scenarios to identify suitable responses and determine how best to assist domestic industries in managing the effects of Trump’s tariffs, he
TIGHT-LIPPED: UMC said it had no merger plans at the moment, after Nikkei Asia reported that the firm and GlobalFoundries were considering restarting merger talks United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電), the world’s No. 4 contract chipmaker, yesterday launched a new US$5 billion 12-inch chip factory in Singapore as part of its latest effort to diversify its manufacturing footprint amid growing geopolitical risks. The new factory, adjacent to UMC’s existing Singapore fab in the Pasir Res Wafer Fab Park, is scheduled to enter volume production next year, utilizing mature 22-nanometer and 28-nanometer process technologies, UMC said in a statement. The company plans to invest US$5 billion during the first phase of the new fab, which would have an installed capacity of 30,000 12-inch wafers per month, it said. The
Taiwan’s official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) last month rose 0.2 percentage points to 54.2, in a second consecutive month of expansion, thanks to front-loading demand intended to avoid potential US tariff hikes, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. While short-term demand appeared robust, uncertainties rose due to US President Donald Trump’s unpredictable trade policy, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s economy this year would be characterized by high-level fluctuations and the volatility would be wilder than most expect, Lien said Demand for electronics, particularly semiconductors, continues to benefit from US technology giants’ effort
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
RSS