TSMC is considering Germany as the site of its first European chip factory – IT Pro – News

TSMC is considering building a chip plant in Germany. The company announced this during a conference call with shareholders on Monday. It will be TSMC’s first chip factory in European soil. The manufacturer is also considering fine manufacturing in Japan.

TSMC notes that it is still evaluating its options and that the company is still at an early stage, the Japanese business newspaper writes. Nikki. “We are in the preparatory phase to see if we are going to Germany,” Chairman Mark Liu told TSMC shareholders.

“It is still very early days, but we are seriously evaluating it, and the decision will depend on the needs of our customers,” said the TSMC president. There are many TSMC customers in Germany, including chip designer Infineon. TSMC also indicates that it is considering setting up a chip plant in Japan. To this end, the company is in weekly talks to “evaluate the feasibility of such a project,” reports Bloomberg. The company is also in talks with Japanese clients.

This is the first time that TSMC has publicly announced that it is considering setting up a chip plant in Europe. Digitimes already issued a report earlier this month, stating that TSMC was considering setting up a German chip factory, she wrote. EENews. That medium later reported that it was a 12nm chip factory near the German city of Dresden, although the company has yet to confirm this.

It has been known for some time that TSMC wants to expand outside Taiwan. The company builds chip factories on US soil, among other things. The manufacturer is currently working on 5nm chip factory in ArizonaWhich will open in 2024. Taiwan semiconductor manufacturer will also consider Multiple chip factories It is prepared in the United States, for example to produce 3 nm.

The European Union, in turn, invests heavily in chip production and gives وي Earlier this year It has already indicated that it wants to cooperate with semiconductor manufacturers such as TSMC. The European Commission now has Semiconductor Alliance To work to strengthen Europe’s position in the chip sector.

Tweakers published in June Backstory on the ambitions of Europe’s chips. TSMC then told Tweakers that the company “does not rule out any possibility,” but the Taiwanese semiconductor manufacturer has no concrete plans to build a European semiconductor plant.

TSMC is not the only company considering building a European chip plant. Intel previously indicated that it Want to build a fab in Europe, for example in Germany or the Benelux. The company wants eight billion euros in support for this. According to the chip giant, this is necessary to make the construction of the plant in Europe more attractive, compared to Asian countries, where it will be much cheaper to build such a plant. Among other things, the company will consider publishing its own expansion plans Many member states of the European Union.