TSMC to promote from within after chairman retires next year

TAIPEI: TSMC, the world's largest contract chipmaker, said on Tuesday (Dec 19) its board had recommended current CEO and Vice Chairman CC Wei succeed Mark Liu who will be retiring next year as chairman, offering continuity to the major Apple supplier.

Company veteran Liu became Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co's, chairman in 2018 after founder Morris Chang, who remains the senior statesman of Taiwan's chip industry, retired.

Liu, who joined TSMC in 1993, said he would like to put his "decades of semiconductor experience to other use, spend more time with my family, and start the next chapter of my life", according to a company statement.

"I am confident that TSMC will continue to perform outstandingly in the years to come."

The TSMC board's Nominating, Corporate Governance and Sustainability Committee recommended that Wei succeed Liu, subject to the election of the incoming board in June 2024.

TSMC is a world class company and the Taiwan stock most held by foreign investors, said James Hwang, chairman of Franklin Templeton Securities Investment Management's Taiwan office.

"Its internal processes in terms of developing professional high-end leadership talent are comprehensive and polished," he said. "I don't think the change (in leadership) will noticeably impact the operation or direction for TSMC going forward."

Wei, who has a doctorate in electrical engineering from Yale University, has been on the company's board since 2017 and joined TSMC in 1998.

TSMC is a major supplier to companies like Apple and Nvidia and its stock price has soared 30 per cent this year, valuing the firm at US$483.3 billion - helped in part by a boom in artificial intelligence applications.

TSMC, Asia's most-valuable listed firm, has repeatedly said business would continue to be boosted by a "mega-trend" in the industry, brought about also by demand for high-performance computing chips for 5G networks and data centres.

While TSMC has said the majority of its manufacturing will continue to remain in Taiwan, it is building new plants in Germany, Japan and the US state of Arizona, to meet global demand and in response to customers who want to de-risk the supply chain from over-concentration in one part of the world.

TSMC, whose chips are used in everything from iPhones and cars to fighter jets, is referred to in Taiwan as the "sacred mountain protecting the country" because of its economic importance.