Legacy Chips How App Developers Professionals Can Benefit from Taiwan's Legacy Chip Industry as it Contemplates its Future This title effectively captures the main theme of the blog post, which explores the potential benefits for app developers professionals in light of the changing landscape of Taiwan's legacy chip industry.

Legacy Chips How App Developers Professionals Can Benefit from Taiwan's Legacy Chip Industry as it Contemplates its Future

The global chip industry is undergoing significant changes, with Taiwan's legacy chip sector facing a major threat from Chinese foundries. The rise of companies like Nexchip, Hua Hong, and SMIC has led to a shift in market dynamics, with these competitors leveraging steep discounts to undercut Taiwanese rivals. In this article, we will explore how app developers professionals can benefit from Taiwan's legacy chip industry as it contemplates its future.

The Rise of Chinese Foundries

In recent years, Chinese foundries have dramatically increased their production capacity and become more aggressive in pitching business. According to TrendForce, China's share of global mature node manufacturing capacity was 34% in 2024, while Taiwan's was 43%. By 2027, China's share is projected to surpass Taiwan's.

This shift has significant implications for Taiwanese foundries, which are forced to adapt or pursue more advanced and specialty processes. For example, UMC, one of the largest Taiwanese chipmakers, is working with Intel to develop more advanced, smaller chips and diversify beyond legacy chipmaking.

The Impact on Taiwan's Chip Industry

The rise of Chinese foundries has sent shockwaves through Taiwan's chip industry. Powerchip Technology, once a leading player in the legacy chip space, has seen its market share decline significantly. The company's chairman, Frank Huang, has warned that mature-node foundries like Powerchip must transform or risk being messed up even further by Chinese price cuts.

UMC is also facing significant challenges due to the expansion of capacity globally. Vanguard International, another Taiwanese chipmaker, has declined to comment on the situation.

The Future of Taiwan's Chip Industry

So, what does the future hold for Taiwan's chip industry? Some experts believe that Taiwan can still compete by specializing in processes and diversifying away from legacy chips. Galen Zeng, a senior research manager at IDC, suggests that Taiwanese chip designers and foundries will likely focus on developing new technologies and products to stay competitive.

Powerchip is also planning to reduce its work on display driver and sensor chips, which are largely used in the Chinese market, and shift focus towards 3D stacking. This technology integrates logic and DRAM memory chips to improve computing performance and reduce power consumption.

Benefits for App Developers Professionals

So, how can app developers professionals benefit from Taiwan's legacy chip industry as it contemplates its future? Here are a few potential opportunities

1. Specialized Chips With Taiwanese foundries shifting their focus towards more advanced and specialty processes, there may be opportunities for app developers to work with these companies on developing custom chips for specific applications.
2. Diversification As Taiwan's chip industry diversifies away from legacy chips, there may be new opportunities for app developers to develop software and services that take advantage of emerging technologies like 3D stacking.
3. New Technologies With the development of new technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML), there may be opportunities for app developers to work with Taiwanese chipmakers on developing chips that can support these applications.

Conclusion

As Taiwan's legacy chip industry contemplates its future, it is clear that significant changes are ahead. While the rise of Chinese foundries poses challenges for Taiwanese companies, there are also opportunities for app developers professionals to benefit from this shift. By specializing in processes and diversifying away from legacy chips, Taiwanese chipmakers may be able to stay competitive and even gain an edge in emerging markets.

Keywords Legacy chip industry, Taiwan, China, semiconductor manufacturing, 3D stacking, artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML).

Edward Lance Arellano Lorilla

CEO / Co-Founder

Enjoy the little things in life. For one day, you may look back and realize they were the big things. Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.