Just weeks after a Taiwanese minister said it was illegal for TSMC to transfer its leading-edge process technology—such as N2 (2nm-class)—from Taiwan to its overseas fabs, another minister said that after N2 enters mass production in the second half of 2025, discussions about transferring the node to friendly democratic nations can take place, reports Economic Daily (as noticed by Dan Nystedt). Yet, TSMC only plans to start making 2nm-class chips in America by the decade’s end.
According to the company’s roadmap, TSMC’s N2 fabrication process is expected to enter mass production by the end of 2025. At that time, discussions can occur about whether the 2nm process should be extended to other friendly democratic nations, said Cheng-Wen Wu, National Science and Technology Council (NTSC) Minister. The comment comes after J.W. Kuo, Minister of Economic Affairs, reminded us that TSMC cannot transfer its leading-edge process technology to other countries due to Taiwanese regulations. As a result, the best production node TSMC can use in the U.S. in 2025 – 2026 will be N3 (3nm-class process technology).
During the campaign, Trump criticized the Biden administration’s CHIPS and Science Act and said that import tariffs would be a better incentive for chipmakers to build fabs in the U.S. than grants, loan guarantees, and tax credits. If he implements such tariffs, it would force TSMC to transfer more of its advanced nodes to its Arizona facility. However, considering the shortage of fab tools, it is unclear whether the company can equip its fabs ahead of schedule.
