Nikkei Shinbun reported on the morning of the 16th that Sony Group Corp. is considering spending billions of dollars to build a new plant in Kumamoto Prefecture in western Japan to produce smartphone image sensors. TSMC’s new factory in Kumamoto purchases logic chips.
The Nikkei report pointed out that Sony’s new factory construction project is expected to break ground in 2024 at the earliest, and it will be put into production at the earliest next year. Taking into account the slowdown in global economic growth, Sony will carefully evaluate the construction time and investment scale. Sony is expected to source logic chips for image sensors from TSMC’s new plant in Kumamoto.
A spokesman for Sony’s semiconductor unit declined to comment on the Nikkei report.
The world’s major economies, including the United States and Japan, are scrambling to increase domestic chip production after the COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic “broke” the global supply chain, Archyde.com reported. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. is currently spending $8.6 billion to build a massive chip factory in Kumamoto, in which Sony and auto parts maker Denso have minority stakes.
(Responsible editor-in-chief: Zhuang Yuyu)