Apple chip manufacturer TSMC will build a new factory in Arizona

Taiwan Semiconductor, a leading manufacturer of silicon chips with contract clients including Apple and Qualcomm, plans to build an advanced semiconductor fab in Arizona, the company announced Friday, confirming a report from The Wall Street Journal a day earlier. The move comes with a total price tag of $12 billion, and also “with the mutual understanding and commitment to support from the U.S. federal government and the State of Arizona,” the company said.

The semiconductor fab would be TSMC’s second manufacturing facility in the US, joining a facility in Camas, Washington, that the Taiwanese company has run since 1998.

TSMC’s expansion follows calls from US President Donald Trump for increased manufacturing in the states, and echoes similar forays from competitors like Samsung and Intel, each of which manufactures chips of their own out of facilities located in the American southwest. Foxconn recently entered the US with a factory of its own in Wisconsin, though with far fewer jobs than initially promised.

Construction is expected to begin in 2021, with production of up to 20,000 semiconductor wafers per month targeted to to start in 2024. The facility will create 1,600 high-tech jobs, TSMC says, citing a “continued strong partnership” with the US and the state of Arizona.

“US adoption of forward-looking investment policies to enable a globally competitive environment for a leading edge semiconductor technology operation in the U.S. will be crucial to the success of this project,” the company said in a statement

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