The “CHIPS for America Act” introduced to Congress last year aims to encourage more plants to be established in the U.S. Michael McCaul, a Texas Republican, plans to reintroduce the bipartisan bill this year with a view to securing $25 billion in federal funds and tax incentives. McCaul said in a statement he’s working with colleagues in the House and Senate “to prioritize getting the remaining provisions of CHIPS signed into law as quickly as possible.
TSMC to establish a $12 billion chip fabrication plant in Arizona. South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co. is set to follow, with a $10 billion facility in Austin, Texas.
The European Union aims to bolster the bloc’s “technological sovereignty” through an alliance armed initially with as much as 30 billion euros ($36 billion) of public-private investment to raise Europe’s share of the global chip market to 20% (without a target date) from less than 10% now.
GlobalWafers Co., based in TSMC’s hometown of Hsinchu, just boosted its offer for Germany’s Siltronic AG to value the company at 4.4 billion euros, an acquisition that would create the world’s largest silicon wafer maker by revenue.
China, in its five-year plan presented in October, is channeling help to the chip industry and other key technologies to the tune of $1.4 trillion through 2025. Yet even that kind of money doesn’t negate the need for Taiwan. Indeed, China has long tapped the island for chip-making talent; two key executives at China’s top chipmaker, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., used to work at TSMC: co-Chief Executive Officer Liang Mong Song and Vice Chairman Chiang Shang-yi.
Fellow analyst Linda Kuo said the Taiwanese government was alarmed by a ransomware attack on TSMC in 2018 and had announced plans for some $500 million to help the industry become more aware of cyber security issues.
The greater worry is that TSMC’s chip factories could become collateral damage if China were to make good on threats to invade Taiwan if it moves toward independence.
A group of Ninety Chinese companies has submitted the application to form the National Integrated Circuit Standardization Technical Committee. According to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in China, the secretariat is planned to be established in the China Electronics Standardization Institute.
The major names among the 90 companies are Huawei, Shenzhen HiSilicon, Xiaomi, ZTE Microelectronics, SMIC, Datang, Unichip Microelectronics, Zhanrui Communications, China Mobile, China Unicom, China Telecom, and Tencent.