The Japanese government is offering ¥129.4bn ($900mn) in subsidies to domestic semiconductor producers Rohm and Toshiba, aiming to secure stable supplies of power semiconductors.
The subsidies were granted on 8 December to the companies, along with their subsidiaries, for their domestic investment in silicon carbide (SiC) and silicon (Si) semiconductor products. The government's financial support accounts for around 33pc of their total investment but its breakdown was undisclosed.
Rohm aim to produce 720,000/yr of SiC power semiconductors and 710,000/yr of SiC wafers from April 2026 in south Japan's Miyazaki prefecture. Toshiba plans to produce 420,000/yr of Si power semiconductors from March 2025 in north Japan's Ishikawa prefecture.
The power semiconductor is a growing market on the back of higher demand from the electric vehicle industry, according to Japan's trade and industry ministry (Meti). Meti Yasutoshi Nishimura said the subsidy allocation was based on the country's economic security law, adding that "establishing new domestic production bases can reduce the dependency on imports".
Both companies are required to keep producing at least for 10 years from the day they start supplying the products, Meti said, to meet the criteria of the subsidy.
The global share of power semiconductors by Japanese producers is falling behind German producer Infineon Technologies, according to Meti, partly because Japanese firms are competing for similar products. Domestic supply capacity will be strengthened in the long run if the two companies concentrate on developing separate products and complement each other, a Meti official said on 8 December.
A Meti official denied that the government is trying to reshape the Japanese semiconductor industry to make the sector more competitive in the global market, although admitting that there could be similar subsidies allocated to other companies.
