"It's a kind of nightmare for us," said Winbond Electronics (
Highly speculative local media reports estimated losses in the Hsinchu Science-Based Industrial Park at between US$150 and US$300 million. Taiwan's semiconductor industry, Hsinchu's largest income generator, is predicted to make roughly US$10 billion in revenues this year -- an average of US$27.4 million per day.
Although TSMC has been in contact with Taipower officials in Hsinchu,. Cheng explained, the state power monopoly had been unable to say when it would resume service to the science park.
An executive at one semiconductor manufacturer, speaking at around 8pm, was harshly critical of Taipower's performance. "I just spoke to them, they were unable to give me a clear schedule [for power restoration]. Although this was an unpredictable event, they need to have a contingency plan; there are many earthquakes in Taiwan. They don't have good staff or good planning ... to help their customers."
Chang of Winbond said he believed some companies in the park were running on emergency battery power only, and could not do so indefinitely.
Winbond is using emergency generators to keep chip production equipment in a stable condition. Without backup power, unfinished chips would be ruined, and equipment could take considerable time to restart.
In view of the problems in Hsinchu, a shortage of chips and other components was the biggest worry for Jeff Lin, marketing manager at motherboard maker, Epox. "I guess for one or two weeks, there'll be no problem, but maybe in a month, there will be a shortage of components." The fledgling science park in Tainan was less seriously affected.
"We've been very lucky," said Jeff His, vice president for sales, marketing and procurement at LCD maker Chi Mei Optoelectronics. "Nothing seems to be seriously damaged," he continued, "other than a few pumps, and we do not have a power outage either." Shi did not expect problems with component supply, because most of Chi Mei's suppliers are based in Japan.
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