Taiwan’s semiconductor industry has been aggressively recruiting talent this year, with its demand for workers in the second quarter rising more than 44 percent from a year earlier, Web site 104 Job Bank (104人力銀行) has said.
The industry is worth NT$3 trillion (US$107.9 billion).
In a white paper on the semiconductor industry’s workforce, 104 Job Bank said that Taiwan-based semiconductor companies averaged 27,701 job openings per month from April to June, the most in six-and-a-half years.
Photo: Tsai Shu-yuan, Taipei Times
That was an increase of 44.4 percent compared with the second quarter of last year and was the fourth consecutive quarter in which the figure rose.
104 Job Bank said that while the global economy has been hurt by COVID-19, Taiwan’s semiconductor industry has benefited from strong demand for emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, 5G applications and the Internet of Things, and continued to grow.
The booming stay-at-home economy, including the rising popularity of online learning and remote work, has also boosted demand for semiconductors, driving the need for more workers, 104 Job Bank said.
Within the semiconductor industry, the IC manufacturing sector saw the monthly average of its job openings in the second quarter grow 55.3 percent from a year earlier, it said.
This compares with 51.2 percent for the IC packaging and testing sector, and 40.8 percent for the IC design sector, it said.
IC engineers accounted for about 55 percent of the job openings advertised in the semiconductor industry per month on average, 104 Job Bank said.
Despite the growing demand, the average monthly wage in the semiconductor industry fell NT$195 (US$7), or 0.4 percent from a year earlier, to NT$52,483 in the second quarter, trailing the computer and consumer electronics industry’s NT$54,640, it said.
The IC design segment offered an average monthly wage of NT$67,834, compared with NT$56,190 in the IC manufacturing segment, and NT$47,014 in the IC packaging and testing segment.
The average pay, including bonuses, in the local semiconductor industry was NT$1.7 million, lower than the NT$2 million to NT$3.5 million seen in the US, Singapore and Japan, 104 Job Bank said.
Sweeping policy changes under US Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr are having a chilling effect on vaccine makers as anti-vaccine rhetoric has turned into concrete changes in inoculation schedules and recommendations, investors and executives said. The administration of US President Donald Trump has in the past year upended vaccine recommendations, with the country last month ending its longstanding guidance that all children receive inoculations against flu, hepatitis A and other diseases. The unprecedented changes have led to diminished vaccine usage, hurt the investment case for some biotechs, and created a drag that would likely dent revenues and
Macronix International Co (旺宏), the world’s biggest NOR flash memory supplier, yesterday said it would spend NT$22 billion (US$699.1 million) on capacity expansion this year to increase its production of mid-to-low-density memory chips as the world’s major memorychip suppliers are phasing out the market. The company said its planned capital expenditures are about 11 times higher than the NT$1.8 billion it spent on new facilities and equipment last year. A majority of this year’s outlay would be allocated to step up capacity of multi-level cell (MLC) NAND flash memory chips, which are used in embedded multimedia cards (eMMC), a managed
CULPRITS: Factors that affected the slip included falling global crude oil prices, wait-and-see consumer attitudes due to US tariffs and a different Lunar New Year holiday schedule Taiwan’s retail sales ended a nine-year growth streak last year, slipping 0.2 percent from a year earlier as uncertainty over US tariff policies affected demand for durable goods, data released on Friday by the Ministry of Economic Affairs showed. Last year’s retail sales totaled NT$4.84 trillion (US$153.27 billion), down about NT$9.5 billion, or 0.2 percent, from 2024. Despite the decline, the figure was still the second-highest annual sales total on record. Ministry statistics department deputy head Chen Yu-fang (陳玉芳) said sales of cars, motorcycles and related products, which accounted for 17.4 percent of total retail rales last year, fell NT$68.1 billion, or
In the wake of strong global demand for AI applications, Taiwan’s export-oriented economy accelerated with the composite index of economic indicators flashing the first “red” light in December for one year, indicating the economy is in booming mode, the National Development Council (NDC) said yesterday. Moreover, the index of leading indicators, which gauges the potential state of the economy over the next six months, also moved higher in December amid growing optimism over the outlook, the NDC said. In December, the index of economic indicators rose one point from a month earlier to 38, at the lower end of the “red” light.