Compromise
A high-ranking official of Rapidus, established with the goal of restoring Japan’s leadership in the semiconductor industry, criticized the U.S. government’s semiconductor regulations while calling them “too aggressive.”
“Rapidus also has a lot of worries,” said Yasumitsu Ori, a senior executive officer at Rapidus, with regard to the U.S. government’s semiconductor export regulations when he spoke at the semiconductor academic conference IEEE EDTM 2023 held at COEX in Seoul on March 8. This marked the first time that a high-ranking official in the Japanese semiconductor industry publicly expressed a negative stance on the U.S. government’s CHIPS Act.
Rapidus is a joint venture established last year by eight Japanese conglomerates, including Toyota, Sony, Softbank, Kioxia, and NTT, to localize cutting-edge semiconductors. It is receiving strong support from the Japanese government, which emphasizes fostering Japan’s own semiconductor industry.
Recently, the United States has strengthened regulations on high-tech semiconductor exports to China, while introducing various subsidy regulations to take the lead in the global semiconductor industry. In order to receive subsidies for the production of semiconductor factories in the United States, the U.S. government set strict conditions on chipmakers such as not being able to expand state-of-the-art semiconductor production facilities in China for the next 10 years and having to disclose all internal information such as corporate financial conditions, cash flows, and employment plans. As a result, the U.S. government’s policies and conditions are forcing the world’s major semiconductor powers such as Korea, Japan, and Taiwan to lose sleep over their future moves in the semiconductor business.
“U.S. regulations weakened Japan’s semiconductor industry in the past,” Yasumitsu said. “But now the United States is trying to take back global semiconductor supremacy via regulations again. Korea and Japan must work together to respond to the U.S. moves.”
Yasumitsu referred to a case in which the United States put trade pressure on Japan’s semiconductor industry to hold it in check in the mid- to late 1980s by investigating Japanese chipmakers’ dumping possibilities or filing lawsuits against Japanese chipmakers, analysts say. “Japan is weak in the memory field but will be competitive in 2 nm logic semiconductors in the future, and Korea has strengths in the memory field such as with DRAM. I think Japanese and Korean chipmakers will be able to cooperate with their respective strengths in the semiconductor industry.”
Yasumitsu evaluated that a recent improvement in Korea-Japan relations would be of great help to the two countries’ cooperation in the semiconductor market. “It is positive that Korea-Japan relations are improving such as with Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol’s visit to Tokyo that will happen soon,” he said.
At the event, experts in the semiconductor industry gathered to discuss whether global semiconductor R&D cooperation is needed in the midst of a supply chain crisis. Other experts who participated as panelists also agreed that U.S. semiconductor regulations are a bit excessive. They all agreed that the United States should pursue both competition and cooperation rather than focusing on a blockade of China.
In particular, Professor Lee Byeong-hoon, director of the Center for Semiconductor Technology Convergence at POSTECH, said, “It seems unreasonable for the U.S. government to impose blockade measures on China and emphasize cooperation with other countries,” adding “However, not a blockade but fair competition is needed between the United States and China. It is necessary to naturally form cooperation within the semiconductor industry on this backdrop of fair competition.”