Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) CEO C.C. Wei announced at the White House on Monday that his company will further invest at least $100 billion in chip-manufacturing plants in the United States over the next several years.
President Donald Trump, who attended the event where the announcement was made, noted that had TSMC manufactured the chips in Taiwan and shipped them to the United States, they would have been subjected to 25%-50% tariffs.
“By doing it here, there’s no tariffs,” Trump said.
Trump said that the deal was critical to United States national security as Taiwan faces the threat of invasion by communist China.
“Without the chips and semiconductors, nothing runs today,” Trump said. “You can’t buy a car without them, you can’t — a radio, a television, you can’t get anything.”
“We thought it was very important, obviously business-wise, but we thought even in terms of national security, to have this large percentage of the chips, semiconductors, and other things” made in the United States, Trump added.
TSMC will invest the money in Arizona to expand the manufacturing plant that it has in Phoenix, where it employs 3,000 people, and will construct three new chip plants, two chip-packaging plants and a research and development center, Wei said at the White House.
TSMC came to the United States during Trump’s first term in office when it announced a $12 billion investment in Arizona, The Wall Street Journal reported.
The company has since expanded in the state, bringing its total investment up to $65 billion. The new announcement brings the company’s total investment to $165 billion.
