TSMC MULLS ESTABLISHING IC PACKAGING PLANT IN U.S.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), the world's largest contract chipmaker, is looking at the feasibility of building an advanced integrated circuit packaging plant in the United States following a massive investment to construct a sophisticated wafer plant in the state of Arizona, according to Nikkei Asia.

The report said a possible IC packaging plant in the U.S. was a response to "Washington's desire to bring more of the tech supply chain onto home turf."

Citing three sources who declined to be named, Japan-based Nikkei Asia reported that TSMC faces a rising need to expand in the US, which accounts for about 62 percent of its total sales.

In a related development, Liu Shu-chin and Frances Huang reported for Taiwan’s Central News Agency (CNA) that the IC packaging plant mulled by TSMC in the US market will use the latest 3-D stacking technologies which can arrange chips with different functions in one package.

Currently, TSMC is constructing an advanced wafer plant in Arizona after an announcement in 2020, which said the chipmaker would invest $12 billion on the company's first wafer plant outside Taiwan in more than two decades.

The Arizona wafer fab will use TSMC's 5-nanometer process, the latest technology the chipmaker has used in mass production in Taiwan since the second quarter of last year. TSMC is also developing 3nm and 2nm processes in Taiwan with commercial production of 5nm technology set for 2022.

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