TSMC Plans Expansion, Sets NT$85 Billion Budget

Since the semiconductor market is growing along with everything else, now that the recession is fading, TSMC decided it was time for a solid expansion so it set up its budget for the year 2011.

Like so many other IT market players out there, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company performed quite well, from a financial standpoint, in 2010.

For those that want numbers, the manufacturer of semiconductors registered a net income of NT$1.62 trillion (or NT$6.23 a share) last year. On that note, consolidated revenues were of NT$4.19 trillion.

Those end-users that need to refresh their memory should know that TSMC is a major supplier of semiconductors worldwide.

Among other things, it makes GPUs (graphics processing units) for both NVIDIA and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD).

Granted, like all IT companies, it went through its share of difficulties, particularly with the 40nm manufacturing process.

Still, as far as anyone knows, there don't seem to be any issues plaguing TSMC right now, save perhaps the possibility of soon becoming pressured by demand.

2010 was, as said, a good year, but with semiconductor demand on the rise, especially now that tablets (which use loads of NAND) are taking off, TSMC has to boost its chip output.

As such, the foundry, as reported by Digitimes, has allocated a fairly solid budget for capacity expansion and new process development.

To be more specific, the capacities of 65nm, 45nm and 28nm chips will be boosted, while the rest of the funds will be spent on setting up the 20nm and 14nm nodes.

The full budget is NT$84.99 billion, which is the equivalent of US$2.89 billion. Meanwhile, the capex should reach US$7.8 billion, 81% of which will be sued for the goals mentioned above.

All in all, TSMC's chip capacity should raise by 20% by the end of the ongoing year. In the meantime, TSMC may or may not decide to set up a pair of wholly-owned subsidiaries for LED and solar operations.