Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday said it would not rule out building a 1-nanometer (nm) fab at the Longtan (龍潭) campus of Hsinchu Science Park (新竹科學園區).
“There are multiple factors that we take into consideration in selecting a manufacturing site. The company will continue investing in advanced technologies in Taiwan,” TSMC said in a statement in response to a Taipei Times question about whether it has chosen Longtan District (龍潭) as the site for a 1-nanometer fab.
“The company will not rule out any possibility. It continues to evaluate suitable sites to build semiconductor fabs in Taiwan,” the statement added.
Photo: Yimou Lee, Reuters
TSMC operates an advanced chip packaging facility in Longtan, company data showed.
The production of 1-nanometer chips would still be several years away, as TSMC is in the process of developing 2-nanometer process technology in preparation for volume production in 2025.
The company’s 3-nanometer process will be the most advanced technology when it is introduced later this quarter to manufacture chips for smartphones and high-performance computing devices, TSMC said.
TSMC’s remarks came after Taoyuan Mayor Cheng Wen-tsan (鄭文燦) told reporters that government agencies are stepping up efforts to expand the Longtan campus to satisfy TSMC’s demand as it builds new manufacturing facilities.
The Taoyuan City Government welcomes TSMC’s decision to deepen its investment by building a 1-nanometer chip facility in the city, Cheng wrote on Facebook yesterday.
As the Longtan campus of the science park is fully utilized, government agencies are working together to expand the science park for TSMC, Cheng wrote.
This project has been under discussions for three years and government agencies have for the past two years been more active in pushing for the park’s expansion, including land expropriation and utilities planning, he said.
The Chinese-language Commercial Times was yesterday the first to report that TSMC was considering setting up a 1-nanometer fab in Longtan, citing an unnamed source.
Asked about the report, Hsinchu Science Park Bureau Deputy Director-General Chen Shu-chu (陳淑珠) said she would not comment on the investment plans of an individual company.
However, the bureau would help companies acquire land in the third phase of the Longtan campus’ development, which has yet to get under way, as the first phase is almost full and the second phase will mainly be devoted to green spaces and parks, Chen said.
Additional reporting by CNA
PROVOCATIVE: Chinese Deputy Ambassador to the UN Sun Lei accused Japan of sending military vessels to deliberately provoke tensions in the Taiwan Strait China denounced remarks by Japan and the EU about the South China Sea at a UN Security Council meeting on Monday, and accused Tokyo of provocative behavior in the Taiwan Strait and planning military expansion. Ayano Kunimitsu, a Japanese vice foreign minister, told the Council meeting on maritime security that Tokyo was seriously concerned about the situation in the East China and South China seas, and reiterated Japan’s opposition to any attempt to change the “status quo” by force, and obstruction of freedom of navigation and overflight. Stavros Lambrinidis, head of the EU delegation to the UN, also highlighted South China Sea
SILENCING CRITICS: In addition to blocking Taiwan, China aimed to prevent rights activists from speaking out against authoritarian states, a Cabinet department said The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday condemned transnational repression by Beijing after RightsCon, a major digital human rights conference scheduled to be held in Zambia this week, was abruptly canceled due to Chinese pressure over Taiwanese participation. This year’s RightsCon, the world’s largest conference discussing issues “at the intersection of human rights and technology,” was scheduled to take place from tomorrow to Friday in Lusaka, and expected to draw 2,600 in-person attendees from 150 countries, along with 1,100 online participants. However, organizers were forced to cancel the event due to behind-the-scenes pressure from China, the ministry said, expressing its “strongest condemnation”
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, said it expects its 2-nanometer (2nm) chip capacity to grow at a compound annual rate of 70 percent from this year to 2028. The projection comes as five fabs begin volume production of 2-nanometer chips this year — two in Hsinchu and three in Kaohsiung — TSMC senior vice president and deputy cochief operating officer Cliff Hou (侯永清) said at the company’s annual technology symposium in Silicon Valley, California, last week. Output in the first year of 2-nanometer production, which began in the fourth quarter of last year, is expected to
Taiwan’s economy grew far faster than expected in the first quarter, as booming demand for artificial intelligence (AI) applications drove a surge in exports, spilling over into investment and consumption, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. GDP growth was 13.69 percent year-on-year during the January-to-March period, beating the DGBAS’ February forecast by 2.23 percentage points and marking the most robust growth in nearly four decades, DGBAS senior official Chiang Hsin-yi (江心怡) told a news conference in Taipei. The result was powered by exports, which remain the backbone of Taiwan’s economy, Chiang said. Outbound shipments jumped 51.12 percent year-on-year to
RSS