In 2005, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), the world’s top contract chipmaker, appointed Rick Tsai (蔡力行) to replace then-chief executive Morris Chang (張忠謀), who was 75 at the time. However, the global financial crisis disrupted that plan and the company re-appointed Chang as TSMC chief executive officer in 2009.
Chang is not the only chief executive to make a return to the business front line. The 2008 to 2009 financial crisis forced Hon Hai Precision Industry Co chairman Terry Gou (郭台銘) to shelve his plan to retire in 2009, as global economic uncertainty continued to plague the electronics industry. Hon Hai is the world’s No. 1 contract electronics maker and counts Apple, Hewlett-Packard and Sony as its customers.
TSMC is now being far more circumspect in its approach to finding a successor.
As the firm looks for ways to boost revenue and profit growth, a complex situation based on the vicissitudes of market demand and inventory has been made even more challenging with the entry of new players into the market, intensifying an already fierce race in technology and capacity buildup.
On Friday, TSMC announced a major management reshuffle, promoting three senior vice presidents from different key business divisions to deputy chief executive and co-chief operating officers, rather than just one as it did in 2005.
Research and development head Chiang Shang-yi (蔣尚義), factory operations head Mark Liu (劉德音) and sales department head C.C. Wei (魏哲家) will take turns overseeing the company’s overall operations.
TSMC’s decision to rearrange its management team came two weeks after US chipset company Nvidia blamed the lower-than-expected yield rate of the Taiwanese company’s advanced 28-nanometer technology for its disappointing gross margin.
That criticism came despite TSMC being at least six months ahead of most of its competitors in commercializing 28nm chips, which help shrink chip size and cut power consumption for electronic products, especially mobile devices.
Competition is escalating as more players enter the market. US chip giant Intel Corp has followed Samsung Electronics Co of South Korea and GlobalFoundries into the contract chip manufacturing market, as all three firms look to make up for weakness in their core PC chip and memory chip businesses.
Samsung, which was little more than a dot on the contract chip manufacturing horizon two years ago, has since grown into a major competitor.
As the business landscape rapidly evolves, TSMC needs to look for well-rounded experts to run the company, but that could prove wishful thinking given the increasing complexity of the chip manufacturing business.
The best option could be to allow the three vice presidents to manage the firm in rotation before one of them is picked as Chang’s successor.
Last year, TSMC’s annual revenue surged to an all-time high of NT$427.08 billion (US$14.47 billion), the third consecutive record since Chang returned to the post of chief executive. This year is expected to be another record year in terms of revenue, benefiting from the fast-growing demand for smartphones that need low-power chips.
The year ahead will be make-or-break for the new executive vice presidents.
Could Asia be on the verge of a new wave of nuclear proliferation? A look back at the early history of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which recently celebrated its 75th anniversary, illuminates some reasons for concern in the Indo-Pacific today. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently described NATO as “the most powerful and successful alliance in history,” but the organization’s early years were not without challenges. At its inception, the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty marked a sea change in American strategic thinking. The United States had been intent on withdrawing from Europe in the years following
My wife and I spent the week in the interior of Taiwan where Shuyuan spent her childhood. In that town there is a street that functions as an open farmer’s market. Walk along that street, as Shuyuan did yesterday, and it is next to impossible to come home empty-handed. Some mangoes that looked vaguely like others we had seen around here ended up on our table. Shuyuan told how she had bought them from a little old farmer woman from the countryside who said the mangoes were from a very old tree she had on her property. The big surprise
The issue of China’s overcapacity has drawn greater global attention recently, with US Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen urging Beijing to address its excess production in key industries during her visit to China last week. Meanwhile in Brussels, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week said that Europe must have a tough talk with China on its perceived overcapacity and unfair trade practices. The remarks by Yellen and Von der Leyen come as China’s economy is undergoing a painful transition. Beijing is trying to steer the world’s second-largest economy out of a COVID-19 slump, the property crisis and
As former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) wrapped up his visit to the People’s Republic of China, he received his share of attention. Certainly, the trip must be seen within the full context of Ma’s life, that is, his eight-year presidency, the Sunflower movement and his failed Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement, as well as his eight years as Taipei mayor with its posturing, accusations of money laundering, and ups and downs. Through all that, basic questions stand out: “What drives Ma? What is his end game?” Having observed and commented on Ma for decades, it is all ironically reminiscent of former US president Harry