Semiconductor industry facing serious talent shortage: survey - Focus Taiwan

https://focustaiwan.tw/sci-tech/202202190006

Taipei, Feb. 19 (CNA) Taiwan's semiconductor industry faced its most serious talent shortage in seven years in the fourth quarter of 2021 as it raced to pump up production to meet soaring demand, a survey by the online 104 job bank has found.

The survey, released earlier this week, found the semiconductor industry facing a shortage of about 34,000 people a month during the quarter, translating to 3.7 offers per jobseeker in December, compared to 2.6 offers in December 2020 and 2.3 offers in December 2019.

In the job market as a whole across all sectors, job applicants averaged 1.7 offers per person in December 2021, up from 1.3 a year earlier and 1.1 two years earlier, highlighting the depth of the shortage in the semiconductor sector.

Several top schools in Taiwan such as National Taiwan University, National Tsing Hua University, and National Cheng Kung University have set up semiconductor institutes, but their talent development efforts are still unable to satisfy employers, the job bank said.

Many factors have converged to exacerbate the problem, including the skyrocketing demand for semiconductors for current and future applications.

The COVID-19 pandemic has sent demand for chip-needy devices for remote work and online learning significantly higher, and the rise of emerging technologies, such as electric vehicles, 5G applications, and artificial intelligence, have sparked a race for the chips of the future.

That, in turn, has led overseas semiconductor companies to seek talent in Taiwan, making the overall hiring environment more challenging for Taiwanese enterprises, Nikkei Asia reported Saturday.

Netherlands-based semiconductor equipment supplier ASML Holding N.V. is planning to hire 4,000 people worldwide this year, including 1,000 in Taiwan, the report said.

Several U.S.-based companies, including American DRAM maker Micron Technology Inc., smartphone chip designer Qualcomm Inc. and equipment supplier Applied Materials Inc., are also hiring in Taiwan, the report said.

At home, the world's largest contract chipmaker TSMC and chip designer MediaTek Inc. are hoping to hire more than 10,000 people this year, while United Microelectronics Corp. (UMC), a smaller Taiwanese contract chipmaker, is planning to hire 1,500, according to the report.

Citing the statistics compiled by the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER), the report said the number of people employed by the local semiconductor industry had risen to more than 290,000 as of the end of 2021, from 225,000 at the end of 2019.

HR consultancy Intelligent Manpower Corp. said annual wages for graduate students from top schools' semiconductor departments can reach NT$1.6 million (US$57,554) to NT$2 million, up about a third since before the pandemic, according to the Nikkei report.

The sector is now even recruiting people who do not have an engineering background, the 104 job bank said.

One of the most prominent cases is TSMC, which is looking to hire analysts with Ph.D.s in political science and international relations, a move reflecting the company's growing interest in geopolitics as it expands its global reach.

(By Liang Pei-chi, Chang Cheng-chien and Frances Huang)

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