Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) would not produce its most advanced technologies in the US next year, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday.
Kuo made the comment during an appearance at the legislature, hours after the chipmaker announced that it would invest an additional US$100 billion to expand its manufacturing operations in the US.
Asked by Taiwan People’s Party Legislator-at-large Chang Chi-kai (張啟楷) if TSMC would allow its most advanced technologies, the yet-to-be-released 2-nanometer and 1.6-nanometer processes, to go to the US in the near term, Kuo denied it.
Photo: Liao Chen-hui, Taipei Times
TSMC recently opened its first US factory, which produces 4-nanometer chips, while construction on its second US factory would begin this year, Kuo said.
As for more advanced chips, “this is impossible,” Kuo said. “I guarantee it — the 2-nanometer and 1.6-nanometer processes will not go to the US next year.”
TSMC is expected to begin mass production of 2-nanometer chips in Taiwan in the second half of this year, followed by 1.6-nanometer chips next year.
Government officials have previously said the company would launch the 2-nanometer process in the US “more or less” in 2028.
Speaking to reporters earlier yesterday, Kuo pushed back on questions about whether TSMC’s investments in the US would harm Taiwan’s advantage in semiconductor manufacturing, therefore reducing its geopolitical importance.
“The entire world relies on chips manufactured in Taiwan,” he said. “TSMC’s chip production in the US and Japan is primarily for customers in those countries.”
“The chips it makes in Taiwan — in addition to [the ones] going to the US and Japan — are also needed to meet the demands of many other customers,” he said.
TSMC’s level of investment in the US is “not [large] enough” to draw the company’s entire supply chain there, Kuo said.
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