The opening ceremony of the "First Factory" built by TSMC's Japanese subsidiary JASM in Kikuyo Town, Kumamoto Prefecture will be held on February 24, and the "Second Plant" will be officially announced on February 6.
It is understood that the Kumamoto No. 1 plant started construction in April 2022, and the building has been basically completed, and part of the office building has been put into use in August 2023, and the production equipment will begin to be shipped to the plant in October 2024, and mass production will begin in the fourth quarter, and the monthly production capacity is said to reach 550,000 12-inch wafers.
"TSMC's JASM Kumamoto plant was supposed to take three years to build, but it took only one and a half years to complete," said Yuichi Hotta, president of JASM, adding that at its peak, about 6,000 workers were involved in the construction of the plant, which significantly reduced the construction period.
The location of the second plant is expected to be adjacent to the first plant, and in order to better support TSMC's development, Kumamoto Prefecture is planning to improve the local infrastructure. Tetsushi Sakamoto admitted that there are still big problems including traffic congestion, industrial water and factory wastewater discharge, but he is still optimistic that the situation will develop in a better direction, and Japan has pledged to provide local financial support of about 750 billion yen (about 36.4 billion yuan).
It is also reported that TSMC has informed the ** chain partners that it is considering building a third chip factory in Kumamoto Prefecture to produce advanced 3nm chips. Relevant practitioners believe that if the second factory plan can be implemented in Japan, it will further promote the concentration of Japanese semiconductor-related industries in Kumamoto Prefecture. However, there are also comments that by the time the new factory is mass-produced, 3nm may have lagged behind the new technology, but at this time, the related technology may also be more mature, in line with TSMC's consistent tradition of transferring mature processes.