Taiwan invests in next generation in chip schools

Taiwan is racing to set up specialised “chip schools” that run year-round to train its next generation of semiconductor engineers and cement its dominance of the crucial industry.

The plans, championed by President Tsai Ing-wen, come as chip companies plough billions of dollars into capacity expansion to make the “brains” that power everything from smartphones to fighter jets, amid a global shortage. Chip giant TSMC alone this year will spend up to $44 billion and hire more than 8,000 employees.

Jack Sun, who retired as TSMC’s chief technology officer in 2018 and became dean of one of the new semiconductor graduate schools last year, told Reuters chip companies need a lot more and better talent to compete on the global stage.

“Indeed, I’m devoting some of my golden years to talent development,” Sun said with a laugh, before pointing out that his former TSMC colleague Burn Lin is older and the dean of another chip school.

Sun and Lin, industry heavyweights turned educators, embody the government’s strategy of strengthening industry-academia ties to remain a critical node in the global chip supply chain.

“In the cultivation of semiconductor talent, we are racing against time,” Tsai said in December at the unveiling of National Tsing Hua University’s College of Semiconductor Research.

Taiwan’s government has partnered with leading chip companies to pay for these schools. The first four were established at top universities last year, each with a quota of about 100 master’s and PhD students, and another has been approved, the education ministry said. “I specifically requested these schools stay open year-round, without winter and summer breaks, so that we can quickly produce talent,” Tsai said at another unveiling.

The chip talent shortage is a top concern for the democratically elected government, which considers the industry critical to economic growth and national security, especially as China steps up military pressure to assert its sovereignty over Taiwan.

Top priority

Even before the global chip shortage, companies worried a talent crunch could hobble the booming industry, said Terry Tsao, president of the SEMI Taiwan industry group. 

In September 2019, Tsao and about 20 Taiwanese and foreign chip executives met with Tsai and urged the government address the issue.

“Everyone thinks this is the top priority,” Tsao said.

Now, as countries pledge billions for domestic chip production and companies scramble to build new plants, the need for people to design, manufacture and test chips has intensified.

In the fourth quarter of 2021, there were close to 34,000 chip industry job openings a month on average on 104 Job Bank, a popular Taiwan recruitment platform, about 50 percent more than a year earlier, according to data provided by 104.