Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, one of the world's biggest makers of advanced computer chips, announced plans in May 2020 to build a facility on the outskirts of Phoenix. Four years later, the company has yet to start selling semiconductors made in Arizona. [...]
In Taiwan, TSMC has honed a highly complex manufacturing process: A network of skilled engineers and specialized suppliers, backed by government support, etches microscopic pathways into pieces of silicon known as wafers.
But getting all this to take root in the American desert has been a bigger challenge than the company expected.
"We keep reminding ourselves that just because we are doing quite well in Taiwan doesn't mean that we can actually bring the Taiwan practice here," said Richard Liu, the director of employee communications and relations at the site.
In recent interviews, 12 TSMC employees, including executives, said culture clashes between Taiwanese managers and American workers had led to frustration on both sides. TSMC is known for its rigorous working conditions. It's not uncommon for people to be called into work for emergencies in the middle of the night. In Phoenix, some American employees quit after disagreements over expectations boiled over, according to the employees, some of whom asked not to be named because they were not authorized to speak publicly.
The company, which has pushed back the plant's start date, now says it expects to begin chip production in Arizona in the first half of 2025.
Cultural expectations about work hours are one thing. But there are other factors involved:
On top of working to address the cultural differences in the workplace, TSMC is gearing up to recruit skilled workers to staff the Arizona plant for years to come. The company faces similar challenges in Japan and Germany, where it is also expanding.
In Taiwan, TSMC is able to draw on thousands of engineers and decades of relationships with suppliers. But in the United States, TSMC must build everything from the ground up.
"Here at this site, a lot of things we actually have to do from scratch," Mr. Liu said.
The article goes on to talk about worker training and talks about how local colleges and universities are creating programs directed at chip manufacturing.
"We have a generation of students whose parents have never once stepped foot into an advanced manufacturing factory," said Scott Spurgeon, the center's superintendent. "Their concept of that is still much like the old mom-and-pop manufacturing where you show up every day and come out with dirty clothes and dirty hands."
I'm wondering how much culturally transmitted tacit knowledge there is in those relationships that exist in Taiwan, but not Arizona.
There's more at the link.
