Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC,
The company has asked the government for final approval, said a Taiwan Semiconductor spokesman, Tzeng Jinnhaw (曾晉皓).
Tzeng made the remarks after several Chinese-language newspapers reported yesterday that TSMC has submitted an application to the government for a second-stage screening procedure to relocate an idle 8-inch plant to China, citing TSMC president Rick Tsai (
The company in January last year obtained preliminary approval by the government of its plan to move the equipment to China, and was allowed to channel about US$898 million there to fund its Chinese unit.
Tsai said up to 40 Chinese engineers are currently in Taiwan for a four-month to six-month training session. Following the training, the engineers will work in the Shanghai suburb of Songjiang.
Major construction at the factory is nearly complete, with dust-free rooms now under construction, according to the reports.
If the government approves the company's application by the end of the second-quarter, Tzeng said the company is confident it will start chip production at the Songjiang factory on schedule.
CAUTIOUS RECOVERY: While the manufacturing sector returned to growth amid the US-China trade truce, firms remain wary as uncertainty clouds the outlook, the CIER said The local manufacturing sector returned to expansion last month, as the official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) rose 2.1 points to 51.0, driven by a temporary easing in US-China trade tensions, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The PMI gauges the health of the manufacturing industry, with readings above 50 indicating expansion and those below 50 signaling contraction. “Firms are not as pessimistic as they were in April, but they remain far from optimistic,” CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said at a news conference. The full impact of US tariff decisions is unlikely to become clear until later this month
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STILL LOADED: Last year’s richest person, Quanta Computer Inc chairman Barry Lam, dropped to second place despite an 8 percent increase in his wealth to US$12.6 billion Staff writer, with CNA Daniel Tsai (蔡明忠) and Richard Tsai (蔡明興), the brothers who run Fubon Group (富邦集團), topped the Forbes list of Taiwan’s 50 richest people this year, released on Wednesday in New York. The magazine said that a stronger New Taiwan dollar pushed the combined wealth of Taiwan’s 50 richest people up 13 percent, from US$174 billion to US$197 billion, with 36 of the people on the list seeing their wealth increase. That came as Taiwan’s economy grew 4.6 percent last year, its fastest pace in three years, driven by the strong performance of the semiconductor industry, the magazine said. The Tsai