TSMC fully booked for second half of the year

Taiwanese foundry TSMC announced it will be operating at full capacity in the third and fourth quarter of this year. The company also notes that it's seeing strong demand for its 20nm process, sales from 20nm are expected to account for 10 percent of total revenues in Q3 2014 and even as much as 20 percent in the final quarter of this year.

Chairman Morris Chang revealed TSMC currently has over 20 tape-out clients for its 16nm FinFET process an added that the firm is setting up a new R&D unit to research 10nm processes. The unit will employ 300-400 technicians and TSMC hopes to enter trial production in 2015 before moving onto mass production in 2016.

The global semiconductor industry is expected to grow 3-5% annually in the next five years, but TSMC's growth rates will be higher than the industry average, Chang said at the company's latest shareholders meeting.

TSMC's wafer production reached 15.67 million 8-inch equivalent wafers in 2013 compared to 14.04 million units a year earlier, said the company, adding that 40/45nm and below processes currently account for 50% of TSMC's total revenues.

Source: DigiTimes