U.S. recently approved the plan of TSMC to build a new 5nm fab in Arizona for US$12 billion over a nine-year period, the Commercial Times reported on November 20. Pursuant to the agreement, TSMC will begin the construction of a new fab in 2021 and start 12-inch wafer production by 2024, with an anticipated capacity of 20,000 wafers per month. Meanwhile, the Arizona state and the US federal government are to provide US$205 million for infrastructure improvements, including water and wastewater utilities, and roads, and landscaping. This new fab will mark TSMC’s first advanced chip fab outside of China. Despite of the COVID-19 outbreak, the global semiconductor market is still estimated to grow at 4.7% in 2020 and the Taiwanese semiconductor industry even expects a 15.6% year-on-year growth, according to MIC (Market Intelligence & Consulting Institute), a major government think tank and leading IT research institute in Taiwan. Robust demand for advanced processing technologies and emerging applications have spurred the growth of Taiwanese foundries in 2020.