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TSMC officially opened Fab 6 in the Tainan Science-Based Industrial Park on March 30, 2000. The 8-inch wafer factory was designed to reach 32,000 wafer starts per month by the end of 2000 and more than 50,000 per month by the end of 2001. It also contained TSMC’s first 300mm pilot line, making the facility both a near-term capacity expansion and a bridge to the company’s next manufacturing generation.
This is a historical account of the 2000 opening, not a report of a new Tainan expansion in 2026.
What opened in Tainan on March 30, 2000?
Fab 6 was built as TSMC’s large-scale 8-inch production facility in Tainan. Construction followed a July 1998 groundbreaking. The fab completed pilot wafers in December 1999 and produced its first production wafers in January 2000, before the formal opening two months later.
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Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteDriver Scan →Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsFree Scan →Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →TSMC described Fab 6 as the world’s largest single semiconductor fab at the time. Its manufacturing cleanroom covered approximately 190,000 square feet. When fully loaded and staffed in 2001, the company expected the site to contain nearly 1,000 manufacturing tools, about 2,000 production and engineering employees, and roughly 320 support staff. TSMC specified Class 100 cleanroom conditions and SMIF minienvironments described as Class 0.1 in its announcement.
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TSMC’s March 30, 2000 announcement provides the opening timetable, facility specifications and company forecasts.
How much capacity was Fab 6 expected to add?
The headline capacity figures refer primarily to 8-inch wafer starts. TSMC’s opening announcement set two run-rate milestones:
- By the end of 2000: 32,000 eight-inch wafer starts per month.
- By the end of 2001: more than 50,000 eight-inch wafer starts per month.
Those targets describe intended monthly production rates, not guaranteed output for every month or audited annual production. Capacity depends on tool installation, process qualification, yields, maintenance, product mix and customer demand.
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1Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errors2Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minute3Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsTSMC’s financial tables used a different measurement. Its first-quarter 2000 report estimated Fab 6’s 2000 capacity at 158,000 annual 8-inch-equivalent wafers, with approximately 32,000 wafers per month at year-end. A second-quarter 2001 report listed 455,000 annual 8-inch-equivalent wafers and approximately 41,000 per month in its cited estimate.
| Measure | Figure | How to interpret it |
|---|---|---|
| Opening announcement, end-2000 target | 32,000 8-inch starts per month | Planned year-end run rate |
| Opening announcement, end-2001 target | More than 50,000 8-inch starts per month | Later planned run rate |
| TSMC Q1 2000 financial report | 158,000 annual 8-inch-equivalent wafers; about 32,000 per month at year-end | Estimated annual and year-end capacity measures |
| TSMC Q2 2001 financial report | 455,000 annual 8-inch-equivalent wafers; about 41,000 per month in the cited table | Another reporting-period estimate, not the opening announcement’s end-2001 target |
The differing numbers are therefore not interchangeable. “Wafer starts per month” is a run-rate measure, while annual capacity is a reporting-period estimate. “8-inch equivalent” normalizes capacity for comparison and does not necessarily mean every wafer counted was physically 8 inches.
See the TSMC Q1 2000 report and TSMC Q2 2001 report for the financial-table estimates.
Which processes and equipment did Fab 6 support?
Initial production was described as 0.25-micron CMOS. TSMC planned a process range extending from 0.25 micron down to 0.10 micron as the fab ramped. The company also cited 0.18-micron and other advanced processes for the period.
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Its planned capabilities included all-scanner lithography, shallow-trench isolation, chemical-mechanical polishing, low-k dielectric technology and copper interconnects. In 2000, 0.25, 0.18 and 0.13 micron technologies were strategically important development and production nodes; describing them as “mature” only makes sense as a retrospective comparison with today’s processes.
The 0.10-micron figure was a planned technology range, not proof that the process was already in volume production when the fab opened. Contemporary EE Times coverage reported that the 300mm pilot line was expected to enter production at 0.18 micron in the third quarter of 2000 and that TSMC had distributed 0.13-micron test chips to EDA companies. Those were contemporary plans and reports, rather than an independent audit of later production results.
Why the 300mm pilot line mattered
Fab 6’s most consequential feature was not a second commercial wafer size. It housed TSMC’s first 300mm pilot line, with expected capacity of approximately 4,500 wafers per month.
The pilot line’s purpose was to evaluate 300mm equipment, process integration and factory systems before TSMC committed those lessons to dedicated high-volume facilities. It was therefore a development and qualification operation, not the main commercial capacity represented by Fab 6’s 8-inch targets.
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How Fab 6 fit TSMC’s broader 2000 expansion
Fab 6 opened during an unusually large capacity program. TSMC’s 2000 annual report said the company invested nearly NT$114 billion in capacity expansion. The contemporary EE Times report described a $4.4 billion expansion program for 2000 and quoted TSMC’s expectation that sales could reach $5 billion or more that year.
Those figures should remain attributed separately. The New Taiwan dollar amount comes from TSMC’s annual-report accounting, while the dollar figure comes from trade reporting and may cover a different scope or convention. They should not be added together or treated as currency conversions.
TSMC was also consolidating capacity through mergers involving TSMC-Acer and Worldwide Semiconductor Manufacturing Company. Its 2000 annual report said total output reached 3.4 million 8-inch-equivalent wafers by year-end, a 90% increase from the prior year. That figure describes company-wide output, not Fab 6 alone.
Why 8-inch capacity was still strategically important
In 2000, 8-inch wafers were the principal high-volume platform for much of the foundry industry. Fab 6 gave TSMC immediate scale for established CMOS production while the company worked through the technical and operational risks of 300mm manufacturing.
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A larger wafer can produce more dies per processed wafer, but moving to 300mm required new tools, handling systems, process controls and factory practices. Running a pilot line inside Fab 6 allowed TSMC to build that experience without making the entire facility dependent on an unproven production platform.
The combination of commercial 8-inch output and 300mm development explains why Fab 6 mattered beyond its monthly wafer count.
What did TSMC say would come next?
EE Times reported chairman Morris Chang saying that Fab 6 would be TSMC’s last new 8-inch-wafer facility and that subsequent new fabs would use 12-inch wafers. The same report described planned 300mm facilities in Tainan, Hsinchu and Camas, Washington.
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That was a forward-looking strategy statement, not a permanent ban on every later 8-inch investment. TSMC continued to operate 8-inch fabs in subsequent years. Its current portfolio is much broader: the 2025 annual report says TSMC and its subsidiaries managed more than 17 million 12-inch-equivalent wafers of annual capacity, including four 8-inch fabs and one 6-inch fab in Taiwan.
The company’s current manufacturing footprint can also be reviewed on its fab-capacity page. These present-day figures provide context, but they do not change what Fab 6 represented at its 2000 opening.
Why the opening remains historically significant
Fab 6 combined four roles in one project:
- It added substantial near-term 8-inch production capacity.
- It provided a platform for 0.25- to 0.10-micron process development.
- It gave TSMC a 300mm pilot line for equipment and manufacturing-system qualification.
- It prepared the company for dedicated 300mm fabs such as Fab 12 and Fab 14.
For semiconductor historians, the key point is the transition taking place inside a single facility. Fab 6 was an 8-inch factory in commercial terms, but it was also part of TSMC’s deliberate move toward 300mm manufacturing and the next phase of foundry scale.
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