Industry sources say that the profitability of pure wafer factories in Taiwan is better than that of their international counterparts.

According to market sources, pure wafer plants in Taiwan, led by TSMC, are expected to achieve significant profit growth this year, surpassing their international counterparts such as Lattice Core.

According to Digitimes, sources pointed out that TSMC will become one of the few pure wafer plants in the world that will be able to maintain profit growth until 2023. The company expects its gross margin and net profit to hit record highs in 2022, in part because its contract prices have risen by as much as 20 per cent.

World Advanced has also made handsome profits since 2021, with its net profit in the first three quarters of this year rising about 80 per cent year-on-year to NT $8.1 billion, with a gross profit margin of 41.93 per cent on average.

UMC's profits grew by more than 100% in the first three quarters of 2021, and the average gross profit margin rose 10.4 percentage points year-on-year to 31.8%. UMC expects gross margin to rise further to 37-39% in the fourth quarter, compared with 26.5% in the same period in 2020.

In contrast, GE Core suffered a net loss of $301 million in the first half of 2021, although its fab capacity has been fully utilized.