The earthquake in Taiwan caused millions of dollars in property damage and several people died. The chip industry based on the East Asian island is also feeling the effects.
The images from the city of Hualien in eastern Taiwan seem ghostly: a multi-story residential building leans menacingly towards the street, it seems as if it could tip over at any time. A severe earthquake caused enormous damage in many places on the East Asian island on Wednesday night.
Since then, rescue work in Taiwan has been in full swing. Hours after the quake, the death toll is at least nine and there are at least 960 injured. With a magnitude of 7.2, the earth trembled was stronger than it had been in the East Asian country for at least 25 years.
In addition to the great suffering of the people, the natural disaster also caused material damage amounting to millions. Homes, businesses and countless other buildings were damaged. The effects are also being felt by microchip manufacturers based in Taiwan, among others.
Chip maker TSMC evacuates factories in Taiwan
The world’s second-largest chip manufacturer TSMC was forced to bring its employees to safety from the particularly affected areas. United Microelectronics Corporation, a smaller competitor, even paused its local production, as reported.
TSMC’s security systems were operating in the green zone, the company told the news agency. To ensure the safety of their staff, some factories were evacuated. The effects of the quake are confirmed. The company did not comment on the extent of possible damage.
Wan-Hsin Liu, senior researcher at the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, describes the situation to Capital: “Although the earthquake was large, the center of the quake was on the eastern side of Taiwan. The chip industry companies, on the other hand, are located on the western side of the island .”
Large companies like TSMC are aware of the fact that earthquakes often occur in Taiwan. That’s why great care is taken during the construction of the factories to ensure that they are as earthquake-proof as possible. “This is particularly true for the manufacturer TSMC, which plays a crucially important role in the global chip industry.”
Aftershocks determine the amount of damage
Liu therefore estimates the impact on site to be rather small – even if the companies had to temporarily shut down their operations. “However, there were and continue to be numerous aftershocks after the major earthquake,” said the expert. “How quickly Taiwan’s chip industry operations can return to normal depends largely on how large and how frequent the aftershocks will be in the next few days.”
If there were larger aftershocks for a longer period of time, the impact on companies and also on the local and global chip industry would be larger and more noticeable. “To my knowledge, chip companies in Taiwan are still in the process of assessing the exact extent of the earthquake’s impact,” Liu said.
According to the Taiwan Meteorological Agency, the last major earthquake in Taiwan occurred in 1999. At that time, 2,400 people were killed. 50,000 buildings were destroyed or severely damaged. It had a magnitude of 7.6.
Source: Stern
