Earlier this week, Sony confirmed that it was considering partnering up with TSMC(Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.) for a new chip plant that will be situated in Japan.
As per AsiaNikkei, the Japanese tech giant confirmed that it is indeed in talks with TSMC during a press conference that it held to showcase its earnings for the first half of 2021.
In this conference, the company’s Chief Financial Officer stated that “The stable procurement of semiconductors is a crucial issue amid the chip crunch, and (TSMC’s plant) could be a solution.” As of right now, Sony outsources the production of most of its logic chips that are key components of its image sensors.
Furthermore, the company is also increasing efforts to attract more clients and improve the quality of its sensors to broaden its applications across multiple different product ranges.
Totoki further added that the brand will hold discussions with TSMC and Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry for the partnership. This collaboration would bring together Sony’s expertise in Japanese chip operations to the world’s largest contract chipmaker that manufactures chips for giants like AMD, NVIDIA, MediaTek, Qualcomm, and others.
While the CFO avoided directly commenting on the investment for this chip plant, he added that “It will be very meaningful for us to further strengthen and deepen our partnership with TSMC, which has the world’s most advanced semiconductor production technology.”
For those unaware, TSMC has been planning to open its first advanced chip production site outside of its home country of Taiwan and will be building a plant in Japan (western Japanese prefecture of Kumamoto to be specific). The construction is scheduled to begin sometime next year and production is expected to begin in 2024.
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