Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, many announce today that it has won Intel Corp’s contract to supply its mobile Internet device (MID) and the Intel Atom processor, a local media report yesterday.
This not only marks the first time that Intel, the world’s largest chipmaker, has outsourced its processor manufacturing, but also is an important contract for the Hsinchu-based TSMC for entering the contract manufacturing market for processors, the Chinese-language Economic Daily News reported yesterday.
Intel executive vice president Sean Maloney and TSMC global sales and marketing vice president Jason Chen (陳俊聖) will hold a joint press conference tonight at Intel’s executive briefing center in Santa Clara, California. TSMC chief executive Rick Tsai (蔡力行) will also attend, the report said.
Statistics provided by market research firm IC Insights Inc showed that Intel was the world’s largest semiconductor firm last year, while TSMC ranked fifth.
Intel chief executive officer Paul Otellini said last week that the company might outsource manufacturing of its Nand Flash memory chips, and a wire report said on Saturday that TSMC could be in talks with Intel over a new contract to supply Nand Flash.
The wire report, however, also said Anand Chandrasekher, senior vice president and general manager of Intel’s Ultra Mobility Group, had hinted that this press conference would be related to the Atom processor.
No matter whether Intel outsources its Nand Flash or Atom processor manufacturing to TSMC, it will help boost TSMC’s capacity utilization rate, the report said.
TSMC yesterday only confirmed that the press conference would be held today, but declined to reveal further information.
A Central News Agency report said that Intel had outsourced production of its South Bridge chips to TSMC in the past, but turned to self-production in recent years, citing an industry insider.
Since the onset of the global financial crisis late last year, many integrated device manufacturers have been forced to close their plants and outsource to contract manufacturers in a bid to lower costs.
In January, Intel also announced the restructuring of its production department, as well as the closure of five manufacturing facilities in Asia and the US.
From a cost perspective, an industry insider said Intel might outsource its orders to TSMC again, the report said.
The Investment Commission yesterday approved a Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) application to invest an additional US$3.5 billion in its Arizona subsidiary to manufactured advanced chips. The world’s largest contract chipmaker’s board of directors last month approved the funding project after TSMC started moving manufacturing equipment into the fab in December last year in preparation for the production of 4-nanometer chips next year. TSMC said it has also commenced the second phase of facility construction in Arizona. The second fab is to produce semiconductors using 3-nanometer technology in 2026. Altogether, TSMC plans to spend US$40 billion on the Arizona fabs, doubling its
KEY SECTOR: Taiwan’s new chip legislation is insufficient, and a more strategic ‘chip act’ that covers the whole semiconductor ecosystem is needed, MediaTek’s chairman said MediaTek Inc (聯發科) chairman Rick Tsai (蔡明介) yesterday urged the government to formulate a state semiconductor strategy and comprehensive “chip act” that includes local chip designers and smaller-scale semiconductor companies, as they are facing intensifying competition from China. The government is playing an increasingly important role in safeguarding the local semiconductor industry’s competitiveness, given that the US, the EU and Japan are offering hefty subsidies and significant tax incentives to build semiconductor capacity domestically, as they have realized the strategic importance of semiconductors, Tsai said. To implement such a program, the government should take steps to finance a “chip act,” Tsai said
Microsoft Corp has threatened to cut off access to its Internet search data, which it licenses to rival search engines, if they do not stop using it as the basis for their own artificial intelligence (AI) chat products, people familiar with the dispute have said. The software maker licenses the data in its Bing search index — a map of the Internet that can be quickly scanned in real time — to other companies that offer Web search, such as Apollo Global Management Inc’s Yahoo and DuckDuckGo. Last month, Microsoft integrated a cousin of ChatGPT, OpenAI’s AI-powered chat technology, into Bing. Rivals
MOUNTING PRESSURE: Although bank failures in the US and Europe would not cause systemic risks, it would dampen consumers’ willingness to spend, GlobalWafers said GlobalWafers Co (環球晶圓), the world’s third-largest silicon wafer supplier, yesterday said that the financial turmoil in the US and Europe has dimmed the outlook for chip demand in the second half of this year, as growing economic uncertainty could dampen consumer spending. The Hsinchu-based wafer manufacturer said it is seeing greater pressure from economic uncertainty on the industry’s recovery, as customers would have not expected Silicon Valley Bank, Signature Bank and a tier-one bank like Credit Suisse Group SA to collapse suddenly. Although the failures are unlikely to cause systemic risks, consumers would be cautious of spending on non-essential items, such