THE INDUSTRY rumour mill is at full spin again, over leaks and unsubstantiated reports that TSMC is planning a wafer fab facility in the US.
The latest speculation locates the facility in New York, in the same region as GlobalFoundries’ Fab 8.
According to reports, a large semiconductor company retained Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu to scout for a location in the US for a wafer production facility with a 297 000 square meter footprint.
The scale of the plant, which will employ 1000 people, eliminates smaller semiconductor players, leading many to abduce that the company involved is TSMC.
If the rumours are true, TSMC’s new fab will join its 200mm WaferTech facility, which is located in Washington.
What is known for certain is that TSMC is also continuing to build fabs in its home country, Taiwan.
TSMC has broken the ground on the site of its Fab 14 gigafab module at the South Taiwan Science Park, located in Tainan.
The module is being constructed as the sixth phase of the expansion plan by TSMC. It will be a 12 inch factory producing 20nm SoCs, and the first 16 nm FinFET chip making facility for the company.