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“The EU attractsTSMCSet up a factory in Germany, with production capacity mainly focused on automotive products with mature technologychip, rather than cutting-edge digital chips, is a very realistic choice. Although Europe has a lot of equipment, materials and third-generation and a half powersemiconductorIt has established unique development advantages in this area, but its entire industrial ecology has serious shortcomings." On August 21, Pan Gongyu, a researcher at the Observation Institute of Guancha.com, said.

On August 20th local time, the European Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (ESMC), a joint venture between TSMC, Bosch, Infineon Technologies and NXP, held a groundbreaking ceremony for its first semiconductor wafer factory in the "Saxony Silicon Valley" in Dresden, Germany, officially launching the initial land preparation stage.

TSMC said that government officials, customers, suppliers, business partners and academics were invited to attend and witness the milestone created by the EU's first wafer fab to provide professional integrated circuit manufacturing services using fin field-effect transistor (FinFET) technology.

Participants in the groundbreaking ceremony included European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, German Federal Chancellor Peter Schör, Saxony Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer and Dresden Mayor Dirk Hilbert.

German media said that beyond the European Chip Act that came into effect last year, the EU has once again established its semiconductor policy goals: before 2030, it will invest more than 43 billion euros in the semiconductor industry and push the global market share of European-made chips from the current 10% to 20%.

To demonstrate support for the project, at the groundbreaking ceremony, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced that the EU has approved a 5 billion euro German subsidy measure in accordance with EU state aid rules to support the construction and operation of the ESMC semiconductor wafer factory.

Reuters reported that the total aid amount for the project will reach 10 billion euros, which is the largest aid approved by the EU's European Chip Law so far and the first aid from Germany. Bosch, Infineon and NXP will each hold 10% of ESMC's shares, and TSMC will hold 70%.

"The plant will operate as an open foundry, meaning that any customer - including but not limited to the other three shareholders outside TSMC - can place an order to produce a specific chip," the European Commission said in a statement.

Reuters also said that mass production is expected to begin in 2027. Although the chip technology produced by the factory will be slightly behindAIThe technology is the most advanced, used in chips and smartphones, but it will add capacity most importantly for cars and other industrial applications that are vital to Europe's manufacturing sector.

"This is a real win-win situation for all of us," von der Leyen said at the ceremony.

But it is still questionable whether Europe's chip manufacturing ambitions can be realized. Pan Gongyu analyzed that according to the current classification of integrated circuits, namely logic chips, memory chips, analog chips, etc., Europe has very few layouts in high-end processor chips and memory chips, so few that they can be almost ignored. If Europe wants to increase its global market share from 10% to 20% by 2030, it means that Europe's analog chip market share must at least double or triple its current level. Currently, there are only three or four European analog manufacturers in the top fifteen in the world: Infineon, NXP, STMicroelectronics and Bosch, so this is obviously an impossible task.

"In addition, TSMC once stated that it would increase the production capacity of automotive chips from the current 5% to 10%, but data shows that the proportion has actually been hovering around 4% in recent years. Even if the production capacity of the Dresden plant is increased by 40,000 pieces per month, it is still far from this goal," he said.

German media published an article in July that the semiconductor industry is accelerating the pace of factory construction around the world to meet the growing market demand. However, in Germany, new chip factories with hundreds of millions of dollars of investment have run into trouble, with only TSMC's new Dresden factory set to start construction this fall.IntelAs early as two years ago, it announced that it would invest 30 billion euros to build a factory here. However, although the company has purchased government land in Magdeburg, Helsinki is also underway, and Germany has promised to provide 10 billion euros in subsidies, Intel has not yet made it clear when to start construction.

The factory construction plan of American semiconductor manufacturer Wolfspeed has also been significantly delayed because the company hopes that the German government can promise to provide more diplomatic support. Wolfspeed is negotiating with the German government.

In an interview with Germany's Handelsblatt last week, the head of TSMC's rival GlobalFoundries Semiconductor said that other chip manufacturers received no subsidies, "which distorted the basis of competition."

The Wall Street Journal reported on August 8 that TSMC has been planning to build three factories in Arizona, the United States since May 2020, with a cumulative investment of up to US$65 billion, which is the largest foreign direct investment project in the history of the United States. However, four years later, the company has not yet started selling semiconductors produced in this factory. During this process, foreign media have repeatedly reported that it has problems in corporate culture and employee management.

German officials also pointed out the importance of recognizing cultural differences. TSMC's model on the island of Taiwan is difficult to directly replicate in other regions, and it cannot be fully realized even in Japan, which is also located in Asia.

This article is an exclusive article of Observer.com and may not be reproduced without authorization.