Taiwan’s semiconductor {industry} has been underneath the worldwide highlight, given its indispensable strategic significance. Analysts have spilled a substantial amount of ink on the implications of geopolitical wrangling for Taiwan’s chip {industry}, and vice-versa. Nonetheless, the Taiwanese authorities and its chip {industry} face one other important drawback – the wrestle to recruit sufficient chipmakers.
In the previous three years, Taiwan’s chip {industry} has frequently struggled to search out sufficient engineers from upstream to downstream of the availability chain. In 2021, there have been 27,701 unfulfilled engineer positions within the {industry}, a couple of 44 p.c enhance in comparison with the second quarter of 2020.
The state of affairs solely worsened in 2022. The job market reported 35,167 unfulfilled positions within the first quarter of 2022, a 40 p.c surge from the identical quarter a 12 months in the past. Even although the world market contraction for chips from the third quarter of 2022 to the second quarter of 2023 diminished workforce demand, the expertise scarcity was right here to remain. Taiwan reported 22,820 unfulfilled engineer positions on this interval.
Taiwan’s declining younger expertise pool presents one other critical problem for the chip {industry} to fulfill its workforce demand in opposition to the backdrop of the present labor scarcity. In the previous twenty years, Taiwan has confronted a gradual discount in STEM graduates throughout each undergraduate and graduate packages. On high of that, Taiwan is coping with the world’s lowest fertility price and an ageing inhabitants that can shrink its general expertise pool.
Externally, Taiwan confronts intensified world competitors for semiconductor expertise as important gamers within the {industry}, together with the United States, China, South Korea, Japan, and the European Union, ramp up efforts to domesticate home expertise and entice overseas professionals. This world coverage sample is pushed by varied motives, together with dealing with rising expertise shortages within the {industry}, empowering home manufacturing capabilities, adapting to new geopolitical dynamics, and recognizing semiconductor’s strategic worth in as we speak’s world.
For Taiwan, the hovering worldwide competitors for chipmakers exacerbates its present expertise shortages as it might trigger an outflow of Taiwanese chip professionals searching for higher alternatives and enhance the problem of drawing in high overseas expertise.
Moreover, the latest “AI wave” is anticipated to enhance the demand for chips, particularly high-end ones utilized in AI purposes, additional underscoring the {industry}’s want for extra workforce for greater productiveness. The latest projection of 20 p.c annual income development by Taiwanese chipmaker TSMC exemplified this rising demand.
Increasing Strategic Focus on Talent Cultivation
Recent world coverage developments exhibit a shift towards extra government-led initiatives in cultivating expertise inside the semiconductor {industry}, and Taiwan is not any exception currently.
In June 2020, Taiwan’s Executive Yuan introduced the “Leading Enterprise Research and Development In-depth Cultivation Plan,” prioritizing core applied sciences similar to rising semiconductors, new-generation cell networks, and AI. Nevertheless, this technique didn’t prioritize expertise improvement like those coming years later. Instead, it positioned extra give attention to overseas funding and progressive functionality.
A 12 months later in 2021, the Executive Yuan launched a brand new technique – “Accelerating Future Technology Research and Talent Planning” – emphasizing the significance of addressing expertise shortages. This technique launched the “National Key Area Industry-Academia Collaboration and Talent Cultivation Innovation Act,” geared toward boosting industry-academia collaboration in semiconductors and AI.
Unlike the technique doc in 2020, which largely disregarded the expertise half, the 2021 technique positioned “semiconductor talent supply” as the primary pillar. The coverage shift mirrored the federal government’s realization of the escalating expertise scarcity attributable to surging market demand from 2020.
Since the laws handed, 9 universities have established new institutes specializing in semiconductors. This technique additionally expanded college packages in essential areas similar to semiconductors, AI, digital engineering, and materials engineering, leading to a ten p.c enhance in undergraduate packages and a 15 p.c enhance in graduate packages.
To advance this technique, the National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) allotted 35 billion Taiwanese {dollars} ($1.1 billion) for the “2025 Top-Down Semiconductor Plan” to ascertain a number of packages to help semiconductor expertise from 2021. These packages have generated 848 grasp’s and 241 PhD-level college students, in response to the legislative briefing in 2023. Additionally, the NSTC-owned Taiwan Semiconductor Research Institute helps 2,100 high-level semiconductor skills yearly.
Following these initiatives, the Taiwanese authorities doubled down on its funding to help semiconductor expertise. In November 2023, the Executive Yuan unveiled the “Chip-based Industrial Innovation Program (CBI).” The plan is anticipated to offer NT$300 billion ($10 billion) within the subsequent 10 years to mix generative AI and chip applied sciences for industrial innovation, refine the atmosphere for worldwide expertise, speed up industrial innovation, and entice overseas funding.
The persisting expertise scarcity in semiconductors has undoubtedly prompted the federal government to make leaps in supporting the atmosphere to foster extra expertise for the semiconductor {industry}. While these insurance policies are principally optimistic, they don’t seem to be complete sufficient to additional tackle the rising expertise want available in the market, as they overlook a number of important elements to unlock extra expertise sources. As such, listed here are some coverage suggestions that the incoming Lai administration ought to ponder.
Adopting a Nuanced Approach
First, the federal government ought to enhance funding in pre-college training on semiconductors to boost college students’ understanding and foster their curiosity. This may embody providing elective programs, visiting lectures, seminars, and academic visits concerning the chip {industry}. This strategy may assist college students develop an curiosity within the subject and the potential to decide on an space of research in school associated to semiconductors.
There have been some preliminary efforts on this space. The Ministry of Education final 12 months launched experimental semiconductor programs in 5 vocational colleges. While strengthening efforts to advertise chip-related programs is essential, the federal government should strike a wonderful stability by providing a various vary of elective programs to make sure the curriculum caters to college students’ diversified pursuits.
Second, the federal government, chipmakers, and tutorial establishments should collaborate to domesticate feminine expertise for the semiconductor {industry}, an underexplored workforce. In Taiwan, feminine enrollment in engineering packages stays disproportionately low in comparison with males, one of many explanation why there are fewer feminine staff within the semiconductor {industry}. For occasion, feminine staff constituted solely about one-third of TSMC’s complete workforce in 2022.
To encourage extra feminine staff within the {industry}, initiatives similar to offering complete details about the semiconductor {industry} to feminine highschool and school college students can encourage their participation in associated engineering packages on the college stage and probably encourage them to decide on a profession in semiconductors. For occasion, main chip corporations like MediaTek and TSMC initiated such efforts in collaboration with tutorial establishments to draw extra feminine expertise final 12 months.
Government, academia, and the non-public sector ought to collaborate to additional encourage feminine expertise to pursue careers in semiconductors by providing devoted scholarships, offering post-graduate hiring ensures, and enhancing the involvement of feminine college students within the subject.
Third, the federal government ought to set up semiconductor departments in vocational excessive colleges in Taiwan to facilitate direct entry into the semiconductor {industry} post-high faculty training and domesticate a expertise pool with sturdy semiconductor fundamentals for additional training on the school stage. This is one other underdeveloped space for potential semiconductor expertise the place the federal government has but to speculate.
Beyond higher using its youthful skills, Taiwan also needs to put money into upskilling and profession transition alternatives for its present workforce. For instance, the Taiwanese authorities ought to create extra well-organized chip-training establishments with potential hiring alternatives, concentrating on people who’re searching for profession adjustments or at present unemployed. This technique can faucet right into a precious section of the labor market by offering avenues for employment in semiconductors.
Lastly, Taiwan should broaden the expertise pool past its nationwide borders. Currently, Taiwan’s chip {industry} largely depends on home expertise, an strategy that can’t be sustained because of the diminishing start price. To that finish, Taiwan ought to actively revisit and revise its immigration insurance policies to extend entry to overseas expertise and meet {industry} calls for. Realistically, it could be laborious for the Taiwanese authorities to advance main reforms in immigration coverage, as demonstrated by the pushback in opposition to admitting extra Indian migrant staff final 12 months.
The authorities ought to conjure up extra artistic and compelling measures to successfully entice extra overseas expertise whereas securing public help. One choice is for the Taiwanese authorities to think about designing a “chip visa” that enables an applicable quantity of government-approved overseas semiconductor engineers to help Taiwan’s most significant {industry}. Taiwan can think about international locations like India, Vietnam, and the Philippines, which are residence to numerous engineers.
The authorities also needs to discover alternatives to collaborate intently with main chip corporations to arrange scholarship packages and language coaching packages, together with post-graduate working alternatives in Taiwan-based semiconductor corporations, for high graduate and undergraduate college students in Southeast Asia. Just lately, South Korean chip big Samsung adopted this strategy and signed an settlement with high universities in Vietnam aiming to safe overseas semiconductor expertise.
Such an strategy is not going to solely be certain that Taiwan can carry extra expertise to help its {industry} however may even equip the members with the experience to work in Taiwan’s chip corporations whereas having fun with life in Taiwan, an necessary consider retaining these skills.
Advocating for a reasonable strategy to draw expert overseas expertise to help Taiwan’s essential {industry} could be extra compelling in gaining public help than proposing intensive immigration reforms, similar to large-scale migrant employee packages.
To make certain, though the federal government is answerable for addressing the expertise scarcity, it’s essential to level out that the scarcity can also be a product of its chip {industry}’s notorious working atmosphere, tradition, and public picture. This can solely be improved by the {industry} itself.
Source web site: thediplomat.com