Apr 3, 2024 - Economy

Taiwan earthquake threatens world's biggest chip hub

Hope King

A building leans precariously with rubble underneath. — Photo: VCG/VCG via Getty Images

The biggest earthquake to strike Taiwan in 25 years killed at least nine people and injured or trapped hundreds this morning, local time.

Zoom in: The island is the world's most important semiconductor-manufacturing hub, with an estimated 80% to 90% of the highest-end chips coming from Taiwan, per Bloomberg.

State of play: The epicenter of the 7.4-magnitude earthquake was on the eastern side of Taiwan, in Hualien County, about 90 miles south of the capital Taipei, where Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing's main facilities are located nearby.

TSMC evacuated some workers and suspended some operations temporarily.
A small local rival United Microelectronics Corp took similar actions.

What they're saying: "There is no damage to our critical tools including all of our extreme ultraviolet lithography tools," TSMC said in a statement, per Bloomberg.

The big picture: TSMC makes chips for Big Tech names including Apple and Nvidia.

"A single vibration can destroy entire batches of the precision-made semiconductors," according to Bloomberg.

Editor's note: This article was updated with an approximate distance between the earthquake's epicenter and the city of Taipei.

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Taiwan earthquake threatens world's biggest chip hub

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