When a 31-year-old engineer surnamed Li was working at TSMC, he had to work 48-hour shifts to help troubleshoot problems because a computer virus paralyzed the operation of the machine. He has been on call day and night for many years, but at the end of 2021, after five years of sacrifice, he was afraid of the phone ringing. Although the annual salary of more than NT$3.2 million is enviable in Taiwan, it is not enough to convince him to stay.

Currently developing a website for an American company, he said that nowadays young people in Taiwan are less willing to endure tiring work in a fab, and related jobs are no longer as glamorous as they used to be.

The talent of engineers has been key to TSMC's emergence as one of the world's most geopolitically important companies, as it has dominated rivals such as Intel and Samsung over the past decade in the race to build advanced semiconductors.

However, many senior executives in Taiwan's semiconductor industry worry that Taiwan will not be able to support the industry's growing demand for a new generation of engineers. Taiwan's population is gradually shrinking, the high-demand workplace culture of chip factories, and other high-tech jobs attract talents, which means that it is becoming more and more difficult for the semiconductor industry to find and retain talents. This has a far-reaching impact.

Taiwan's talent crisis is inseparable from TSMC's success. In the past 10 years, the total number of employees of TSMC has increased by nearly 70%, but the birth rate in Taiwan has been cut in half. Labor can only wait for start-up companies in emerging fields to attract top engineers. TSMC must compete with Internet companies such as Google and semiconductor factories such as ASML in the Netherlands when selecting talents. Foreign companies usually have a better work-rest balance and benefits.

  TSMC executives defend the demanding workplace culture that has helped them thrive over the years. Founder Zhang Zhongmou recently emphasized TSMC's military discipline, for example, the company will call in the middle of the night to wake up employees to go to work. However, Liu Deyin, chairman of TSMC, has said frankly many times in recent years that the biggest challenge facing Taiwan's semiconductor industry is the shortage of talents.

For this reason, TSMC has adjusted its strategy, expanded its talent selection channels and raised the base salary for a master’s degree; it recruited graduates in September last year, much earlier than the traditional job hunting season in March each year; it even taught high school students basic knowledge of semiconductors through online courses.

  Lin Benjian, dean of the Institute of Semiconductor Research at National Tsing Hua University, who was the deputy general manager of TSMC's research and development, said that many companies have difficulty finding suitable candidates, and they are not very picky when seeking talents. Electrical or information engineering backgrounds are not necessary.

  Under the appeal of Liu Deyin, MediaTek Chairman Cai Mingjie and other industry leaders, Taiwan will set up four semiconductor colleges in 2021, and Tsinghua University is one of them. Taiwan is "a race against time" in the cultivation of semiconductor talents.

Taiwan is not alone in facing these challenges, as the global semiconductor industry is facing a talent shortage.

  China has tried to attract Taiwanese engineers to support the semiconductor industry, but the Institute of Semiconductors of the Chinese Academy of Sciences is still worried about a "serious shortage" of qualified personnel. It is estimated that there is a talent gap of 200,000 in China's IC industry.

In the United States, the government has spent a lot of money on subsidies, which has stimulated major semiconductor manufacturers such as Intel, Samsung, and TSMC to announce plans to build factories. However, surveys by corporate executives show that talent shortage is still one of the most serious challenges facing the industry.