Taiwan should collaborate with trusted partners to maintain its edge in advanced semiconductor manufacturing, while also confronting China’s increasing global share of legacy chip production, a panel of experts told a forum in Taipei yesterday.
While Taiwan enjoys a “strong and capable” ecosystem in advanced semiconductor manufacturing, it needs to continue working with global partners to “build up the alliance [and] interconnections,” former US security official Joe Wang said.
Additionally, Taiwan should collaborate with those partners on boosting the production of legacy chips, Wang said, referring to less advanced semiconductors that are used in household appliances and automobiles, among others.
Photo: CNA
Global legacy chipmaking has increasingly become “skewed toward China,” Wang said, adding that the situation was “extremely concerning.”
The Chinese government has subsidized production of legacy chips “in a way that none of the rest of our countries can do,” adding that such an approach was not business-driven, but aimed at expanding Beijing’s political influence, Wang said.
Cooperation between trusted partners is needed to balance China’s competitiveness in manufacturing legacy chips, also known as mature nodes, he added.
Wang, who spoke in his capacity as a senior advisor at the Virginia-based think tank Special Competitive Studies Project, previously served as the US National Security Council’s director for Russia.
His comments echoed those of US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo, who in April said that China was producing about 60 percent of legacy chips in the world and would continue to do so in the coming years.
The surge in Chinese production was partly caused by US-led export bans on advanced chips and chipmaking equipment to China on national security grounds, some observers said.
Sharing Wang’s concerns, Institute of Geoeconomics director Kazuto Suzuki cautioned against complacency and underscored prioritizing the maintenance of “technological superiority.”
“We cannot just sit and relax,” he said.
China was also striving to make advanced chips, despite facing restricted access to those that power artificial intelligence and other cutting-edge technologies, Suzuki added.
Suzuki urged Japan and Taiwan to further explore collaboration opportunities for semiconductor research and development, such as facilitating the exchanges of technologies, ideas and people.
“Friendshoring is not just about production and trade,” he said. “Friendshoring is also about how to share the information, how to share intellectual property [and] how to maintain those movements of people.”
The Japanese expert was alluding to an emerging trend in trade where supply chain networks prioritize countries seen as political and economic partners.
South Korean economist Yeon Won-ho, a member of the South Korean Presidential Office’s policy advisory committee, also called for cooperation between his country and Taiwan, saying that the two were not “competitors,” but were “complementary” to each other.
One key area for possible collaboration between Taiwan and South Korea is information and communication technology services and devices, Yeon said.
This represents an emerging market, Yeon said, particularly as the US government seeks to ban Chinese-made communications and automated driving systems in cars for fear of data collection by Chinese companies.
The forum was co-organized by the Research Institute for Democracy, Society and Emerging Technology, a national think tank established in October last year under Taiwan’s National Science and Technology Council.
INFRASTRUCTURE: Work on the second segment, from Kaohsiung to Pingtung, is expected to begin in 2028 and be completed by 2039, the railway bureau said Planned high-speed rail (HSR) extensions would blanket Taiwan proper in four 90-minute commute blocs to facilitate regional economic and livelihood integration, Railway Bureau Deputy Director-General Yang Cheng-chun (楊正君) said in an interview published yesterday. A project to extend the high-speed rail from Zuoying Station in Kaohsiung to Pingtung County’s Lioukuaicuo Township (六塊厝) is the first part of the bureau’s greater plan to expand rail coverage, he told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). The bureau’s long-term plan is to build a loop to circle Taiwan proper that would consist of four sections running from Taipei to Hualien, Hualien to
A relatively large earthquake may strike within the next two weeks, following a magnitude 5.2 temblor that shook Taitung County this morning, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. An earthquake struck at 8:18am today 10.2km west of Taitung County Hall in Taitung City at a relatively shallow depth of 6.5km, CWA data showed. The largest intensity of 4 was felt in Taitung and Pingtung counties, which received an alert notice, while areas north of Taichung did not feel any shaking, the CWA said. The earthquake was the result of the collision between the Philippine Plate and the Eurasian Plate, the agency said, adding
Snow fell in the mountainous areas of northern, central and eastern Taiwan in the early hours of yesterday, as cold air currents moved south. In the northern municipality of Taoyuan, snow started falling at about 6am in Fusing District (復興), district head Su Tso-hsi (蘇佐璽) said. By 10am, Lalashan National Forest Recreation Area, as well as Hualing (華陵), Sanguang (三光) and Gaoyi (高義) boroughs had seen snowfall, Su said. In central Taiwan, Shei-Pa National Park in Miaoli County and Hehuanshan National Forest Recreation Area in Nantou County saw snowfall of 5cm and 6cm respectively, by 10am, staff at the parks said. It began snowing
The 2025 Kaohsiung Wonderland–Winter Amusement Park event has teamed up with the Japanese manga series Chiikawa this year for its opening at Love River Bay yesterday, attracting more than 10,000 visitors, the city government said. Following the success of the “2024 Kaohsiung Wonderland” collaboration with a giant inflatable yellow duck installation designed by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman, this year the Kaohsiung Tourism Bureau collaborated with Chiikawa by Japanese illustrator Nagano to present two giant inflatable characters. Two inflatable floats — the main character, Chiikwa, a white bear-like creature with round ears, and Hachiware, a white cat with a blue-tipped tail
RSS