Taiwan’s technology sector has been told to shift from making everything at home to a broader “made with Taiwan” production model.
According to Focus Taiwan, Foxconn chairman Young Liu said customers increasingly want production spread across several countries to reduce risk across fragile technology supply chains.
Governments want more of the products they consume to be manufactured locally, which is pushing Taiwanese firms to expand outside Taiwan.
Liu made the comments during a discussion at SEMICON Taiwan 2026 in Taipei, where industry leaders assessed AI demand and geopolitical pressures.
“We all have to think about how to make it with Taiwan, not in Taiwan,” Liu said.
Liu said Taiwan’s culture, education system and stable government policies had helped its companies deliver quality and speed for global customers.
He said those strengths could be applied abroad, with Taiwanese companies moving some production closer to the countries where their products are used.
TSMC senior vice-president and deputy co-chief operating officer Cliff Hou said AI demand is already outpacing Taiwan’s semiconductor supply chain expansion.
Hou said TSMC’s equipment purchase forecast rose from its original baseline to 1.5 times that level after the first quarter.
By July, the figure had reached 1.9 times the original estimate, nearly doubling in six months as AI demand continued to rise.
Hou said TSMC is building 13 fabs in Taiwan and another five or six overseas, compared with four or five projects in the past.
MediaTek chief executive Rick Tsai said Taiwan’s advantage came from its technology, flexibility and speed across PCs, mobile phones and AI.
Tsai said Taiwan’s supply chain was already “a global Taiwan,” rather than an operation limited to the island’s domestic manufacturing base.
Unimicron Technology chairman Shan-Chieh Chien said AI demand had worsened shortages of semiconductor substrates and created demand for bigger, more complex designs.
Chien said the industry depends on critical tool and material suppliers, including smaller Japanese firms already facing capacity pressure of their own.
ASE chief executive Tien Wu said cooperation across the semiconductor ecosystem was now essential because no company could handle the expansion alone.
“Again and again, collaborate because we cannot do this alone. Our dependency goes beyond comprehension.” Wu said.
