Trump Administration Courting Taiwan’s TSMC.

According to a recent Wall Street Journal report, U.S. President Trump’s administration is in the process of working on a bid to attract TSMC –  (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) to the states.

The world’s largest producer of semiconductors, TSMC has facilities around Taiwan with several others located overseas, most notably in China.

There is currently one wholly owned subsidiary in the U.S. but on the back of the COVID-19 pandemic supply chains have been disrupted and even suspended in the industry.

As a result, with U.S. tech companies highly reliant on Asian semiconductor producers in recent years, the government in Washington is looking to counter its dependency as well as an upward swing in production by China, by attracting both TSMC and Korean giants Samsung to set up plants locally.

At least for the time being.

In the same report the Wall Street Journal refers to U.S. intelligence chiefs at the Pentagon saying “(the) coronavirus pandemic underscores vulnerability from reliance on Asian factories.”

To this end, America’s end goal is to increase its own levels of self-sufficiency in semiconductor production.

It is understood that Japan, with much the same goal in strengthening its domestic semiconductor supply chains is also actively trying to engage TSMC and even Intel Corporation to set up shop in Japan.

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has led to nations worldwide looking more at self-sufficiency across many fields to best avoid possible future shortages arising from a return of the coronavirus, or unrelated pandemics, leading to global lockdowns.