In recent years, TSMC has expanded its base globally, highlighting the fact that countries rely on Taiwan for advanced chips, and winning more international negotiations and attention for Taiwan.

(Associated Press)

[Compile Lu Yongshan/Comprehensive Report] In addition to investing and setting up factories in the United States and Japan, TSMC, the world's leading wafer foundry, has also recently reported that it will build Europe's first wafer factory in the German city of Dresden.

TSMC's expansion of global presence highlights the fact that countries rely on Taiwan for advanced chips. Even if the two major powers of the United States and China are committed to achieving independence in chip production, as long as the two countries fail to achieve this goal, Taiwan will retain the "silicon shield" of the semiconductor industry. , to win more international negotiations and attention for Taiwan.

"Deutsche Welle" reported that there are political reasons behind TSMC's global expansion: China's military invasion of Taiwan is more and more likely to become a reality. Under such existential threats, TSMC and its customers must find a way out for the future.

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70% of the world's chips are manufactured in East Asian countries such as Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, and China, and TSMC handles 92% of advanced chip manufacturing, that is, chips below 10 nanometers.

Taiwan's semiconductor industry is called the "Silicon Shield", a shield against China. If China really attacks Taiwan, the global economy will face a catastrophe, and China, which relies on Taiwan's chips, will also be in great trouble.

Supply chain disruptions that have stalled production of millions of cars around the world and kept consumers and businesses hungry for electronics during the coronavirus pandemic are among the reasons many countries are pushing to boost domestic chip production.

For example, China hopes to achieve a 70% chip self-sufficiency rate by 2025, and the United States passed the "Chip and Science Act" in early August last year, which will use $53 billion to promote chip production in the United States.

However, in order to restrict the development of China's semiconductor industry, the Biden administration of the United States has imposed sanctions on China's chip industry and prohibited the United States from exporting related technologies to China. This is another reason why China is now investing a lot of money in the development of the chip industry.

Under such circumstances, China may theoretically take over Taiwan's most advanced semiconductor industry by force, but Li Chun, senior deputy executive director of the WTO and RTA Center of the Chung-Hwa Economic Research Institute, believes that it is actually unlikely. China's efforts to develop technology pose a major challenge because almost all materials, chemicals or spare parts needed for semiconductor production come from the US, Europe and Japan, and if Taiwan is occupied by China, then at least the US will no longer supply these materials. Moreover , China also lacks professionals to run a company like TSMC.”

Li Chun said that as long as China cannot produce by itself, China needs Taiwan's modern chips, and self-production will be a very long process. China's largest chip manufacturer SMIC was blacklisted when Trump was in power, and has since been Access to much-needed American technology is limited.

Benjamin Hein, general manager of the Asia-Pacific region of German semiconductor supplier Merck, said: "It takes 3 to 6 months to manufacture a chip. In the chip production process, one thing is crucial: a very clean environment, customers know Taiwan meets extremely high standards, which is not the case everywhere else. China is unlikely to take over chip production in the near future.”

He Tianming also pointed out that the semiconductor industry is a global industry, and it is very complicated to produce completely locally. For example, it takes 3 to 5 years to build a factory, and the cost can be as high as 10 billion US dollars. It is impractical to build an entire ecosystem in one country. .

Therefore, as long as China and the United States do not achieve independence in chip production, Taiwan will retain its "silicon shield." Taiwan's leading position in this indispensable commodity has won it more international negotiations and attention.

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