TSMC saw profits in January despite of a slow season.
TSMC Has a Stellar Year
Recession is over? TSMC, UMC, VIS show large growth in orders
When world recession struck last year, contract foundries were hit really hard, with utilization dropping as low as 30%, sending workers home, introducing single-shift days and 4-day weeks. Largest players in the field, Taiwanese TSMC, UMC were forced to live through all of these measures in order to stay in the black. Courtesy of DigiTimes, we learned that both TSMC and UMC are reporting utilization growing back to 50-60%, thanks to a large number of rushed orders by foreign contracting firms. If we look at a chart above, we see that in December ’08, TSMC dipped as low as negative 31.5% compared to October, while
