Earlier this year, TSMC announced plans to spend between $52 billion and $56 billion on all-new manufacturing capacities, upgrading existing fabs, and building advanced packaging facilities. The contract chipmaker plans to spend between 70% and 80% of its 2026 CapEx on advanced process technologies, between 10% and 20% of the budget on advanced packaging and mask making, as well as approximately 10% on specialty technologies.
Accelerated spending on advanced fabs is designed to make TSMC unbeatable to Intel and Samsung Foundry when it comes to availability of the state-of-the-art production capacities. If the company has considerably more capacity than its rivals, it will be more likely to land big orders from big customers. If TSMC has slightly more capacity than its clients need, then the latter will unlikely outsource even a part of their production to competitors.
Another notable happening at the meeting is the promotion of S.S. Lin — who is currently senior director at TSMC's research and development organization responsible for the development of the company's A10 process technologies (1nm-class) — to a vice president status.
The promotion is likely a sign that the upper management is satisfied with where the A10 platform development is going and the preliminary results that have been achieved so far. The promotion may also mean that as a VP, S.S. Lin will be able to oversee more technology programs than a single (yet very important) process node as well as have greater influence over roadmap goals, priorities, and resource allocation, though we are speculating. Also, as the A10 program is moving from research and development towards finalization and adoption by partners and customers, the program leader may need to have more power to execute their goals.
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Key considerations
- Investor positioning can change fast
- Volatility remains possible near catalysts
- Macro rates and liquidity can dominate flows
Reference reading
- https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/semiconductors/SPONSORED_LINK_URL
- https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/semiconductors/tsmcs-board-approves-usd45-billion-spending-package-on-new-fabs-record-sign-off-signals-aggressive-expansion-to-grow-capacity#main
- https://www.tomshardware.com
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