Chinese authorities should seize Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) if the US were to sanction Beijing in a similar way that it acted against Russia, a senior Chinese economist said in a transcript released yesterday.
“If the US and the West impose destructive sanctions on China like sanctions against Russia, we must recover Taiwan,” China Center for International Economic Exchanges Chen Wenling (陳文玲) said last month.
The research group is overseen by the National Development and Reform Commission, China’s top economic planning agency.
Photo: Cheng, I-hwa, Bloomberg
“Especially in the reconstruction of the industrial chain and supply chain, we must seize TSMC,” Chen said in a speech at an event hosted by the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University, with the transcript posted online yesterday by the Guancha news Web site.
“They are speeding up the transfer to the US to build six factories there,” she said. “We must not let all the goals of the transfer be achieved.”
The comments are some of the most prominent so far showing how Taiwan’s chip industry is seen in Beijing as a key strategic asset in the intensifying rivalry between the world’s two largest economies.
TSMC is the world’s largest contract manufacturer of semiconductors, accounting for more than 50 percent of the global foundry market, which involves businesses purely making chips for other companies. Its customers include Apple Inc, which relies on Taiwanese chips for iPhones.
A TSMC representative declined to comment on Chen’s remarks.
Media reports have said that TSMC is to build six chip fabs in the US, but the company has announced just one so far. It has bought more land for possible construction.
It is unclear how the scenario Chen described would occur, given that the US and other nations only leveled harsh economic sanctions on Russia after it invaded Ukraine in February.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) has sought to achieve tech self-sufficiency and tapped his economic czar, Chinese Vice Premier Liu He (劉鶴), to shepherd a key initiative aimed at helping domestic chipmakers overcome US sanctions.
Those sanctions, which were initiated by the administration of former US president Donald Trump, are impeding longer-term efforts by chipmakers from migrating toward more advanced wafer fabrication technologies.
REASSURANCE: The company, which installed new equipment in its Taichung plant, said that it would produce 1-gamma nanometers node DRAMs in Taiwan in 2025 US-based memorychip supplier Micron Technology Inc on Friday said that it would start producing its most advanced DRAM exclusively in Taiwan in 2025. Micron said that it would mass produce chips using its advanced 1-gamma process node DRAM in Taiwan, ahead of any other production site worldwide. The company installed cutting-edge extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography production equipment in its A3 fab in Taichung last year. The 1-gamma process — its third-generation 10 nanometer-class node — was jointly developed by Micron’s research and development (R&D) teams in Taiwan and Japan. Micron on Thursday said it would invest up to US$3.6 billion in Japan. A Ministry
MARKET GAP: If China stops buying chips from US firm Micron, they might turn to competitors such as Nanya and South Korean suppliers, researchers said Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) shares rallied nearly 4 percent during early trading yesterday amid optimism that the nation’s biggest DRAM chipmaker would benefit from China’s latest ban on purchasing memory chips from Micron Technology Inc. The restrictions are widely considered a result of an escalating technology dispute between the US and China. Chinese firms might shift orders to non-US suppliers such as Nanya Technology and South Korean memory chipmakers Samsung Electronics Co and SK Hynix Inc. The Cyberspace Administration of China on Sunday night said that its review found that Micron’s memory chips pose serious network security risks to the country’s critical
SECURITY RISK: Chinese companies could respond to the announcement by moving away from all products made by the US firm, diverting business toward Korean rivals China delivered the latest salvo in an escalating semiconductor war with the US, announcing that Micron Technology Inc products have failed to pass a cybersecurity review in the country. Operators of key infrastructure in China should not buy the company’s goods, the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) said in a statement on Sunday, adding that it found “relatively serious” cybersecurity risks in Micron products sold in China. The components caused “significant security risks to our critical information infrastructure supply chain,” which would affect national security, it said. The results come more than a month after China announced an investigation on imports from
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) senior vice president of business development Kevin Zhang (張曉強) told reporters yesterday that talks over a possible plant in Germany are continuing and that the earliest decision would be in August. “I don’t want to get into the politics side of the thing, but I do think that there is a need for us to provide our customers with a diverse supply,” Zhang said, adding that Europe is a “very significant geography given the customer base ... [and] the demand.” Zhang did not confirm the size of subsidy or cost of the potential project or
RSS