The Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) announced on July 17 that it is accelerating production at its Arizona semiconductor facility by several quarters, driven by “explosive growth” for artificial intelligence (AI) from U.S. and other global customers.
Regarding the company’s U.S. operations, Wei stated during its second-quarter earnings call that the first fabrication plant in Arizona has already achieved high-volume production in the fourth quarter of 2024, using the company’s advanced nanometer technology to produce results comparable to those of the company’s fab operations in Taiwan. The construction of the second fab, which will utilize even more advanced nanometer-scale process technology, is now complete, he said.
“We are seeing strong interest from our leading U.S. customers and are working on speeding up the volume production schedule by several quarters to support their needs,” said Wei.
“The construction and ramp schedule for those fabs will be based on our customers’ need. Our expansion plan will enable TSMC to scale up to a detailed fab faster in Arizona to support the needs of our leading-edge customers in smartphone, AI, and high-performance computing (HPC) applications.”
Along with the company’s U.S. expansion, Wei told Wall Street analysts that recent developments are positioned to meet the long-term demand outlook for AI globally. He pointed out that despite uncertainties and risks from potential U.S. tariff policies, any negative effects will be short-term, and “demand for semiconductors is very fundamental and will continue to be robust.”
“The explosive growth in token volume demonstrate increasing AI model usage and adoption, which means more and more computation is needed, leading to more leading and silicon demand. We also see AI demand continuing to be strong, including the rising demand from sovereign AI,” said Wei.
Aside from TSMC’s growth in AI and high-performance computing, Wei also addressed analyst questions about the company’s efforts to develop a humanoid robot. Earlier this year, at the company’s 2025 Technical Symposium in Santa Clara, California, TSMC estimated that it could potentially produce 2.5 million chips for humanoid robots and about 2.5 million chips for robotaxis by 2030. TSMC also projected that humanoid robots and robotaxis will generate $1 trillion in annual revenue in five years.
“You know, it’s very complicated because it’s not just about the brain. Actually, you’re talking about a lot of sensor technology. That’s the image sensor, the pressure sensor, the temperature sensor, and all the feedback to the CPU, and so it’s very complicated, and since it’s dealing with a human being directly, I should be very, very careful,” Wei said.
The Taiwan technology conglomerate, the world’s largest chipmaker by revenue, also revised its previous forecast for the third-quarter revenue to the range of $31.8 billion to $33 billion, up 38 percent from a year ago and an 8 percent improvement over the previous quarter.