Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said it is stepping up recruitment this year to cope with rigorous demand, primarily for chips for 5G products and for high-performance computing.
The company, which supplies chips for Apple Inc iPhones, plans to hire 8,000 people this year, TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) told reporters on the sidelines of a news conference to unveil a revamped semiconductor exhibition at the National Museum of Natural Science in Taichung.
“Our business is exceptionally strong this year. We usually hire about 4,000 new workers a year,” Liu said. “We are scaling up [recruitment] this year.”
Photo: Tsai Shu-yuan, Taipei Times
TSMC last month raised its revenue growth forecast for this year to 20 percent from a year earlier after in April forecasting growth of between 15 percent and 19 percent as 5G and high-performance computing applications spur demand for advanced 5-nanometer and 7-nanometer technology.
The firm last year employed 5,000 people to support growth, bringing its overall headcount to 51,297 as of Dec. 31, a TSMC annual report showed.
TSMC had low turnover last year of 4.9 percent, the report showed.
Liu yesterday dismissed a report last week in the Nikkei Asian Review, which said that more than 100 engineers and experienced managers from TSMC had been poached by Chinese rivals since last year to build their own semiconductor technologies and reduce dependence on foreign supply.
“The report is not true,” Liu said.
The COVID-19 pandemic has prevented people from leaving Taiwan over the past six months, he said.
TSMC yesterday repeated its call for the government to adjust the nation’s higher-education system to cope with rapidly growing demand for semiconductor talent.
Talent demand among local semiconductor firms is outgrowing the number of local university graduates as businesses expand rapidly, Liu said.
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