At SEMICON Japan 2024, JASM president Yuichi Horita announced that TSMC's first wafer fab in Kumamoto, Japan, is on track to begin mass production within 2024, reports Nikkei. The facility, advancing as scheduled, will initially supply logic ICs to Sony and Denso. Horita highlighted that production lines at Kumamoto have been configured to meet TSMC's high-quality standards established in Taiwan.
During the opening ceremony in February 2024, TSMC reaffirmed the commencement of mass production at the Kumamoto facility within the year. The fab will employ 22/28nm and 12/16nm process technologies for its logic ICs.
A second fab expansion is already underway, with operations anticipated by 2027. While land preparation is in progress, construction is slated to begin in early 2025. These two facilities from JASM will have a combined monthly capacity to produce over 100,000 12-inch wafers, serving automotive, industrial, consumer electronics, and high-performance computing sectors with various process technologies. The total investment for JASM will exceed US$20 billion, and the Japanese government has pledged JPY1.2 trillion (approximately US$7.8 billion) in subsidies to bolster Japan's semiconductor sector.
JASM targets a local procurement rate of 60% by 2030. The company has already achieved a procurement rate of over 45% and projects will reach 50% by 2026.
