Jun Sawada, chairman of Japanese telecommunications giant Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT), said in an interview with Reuters that if Japan wants to revive its once prosperous chip industry, it should takeDifferentiated competitive strategyLay out the chip manufacturing field instead of competing head-on with opponents in terms of scale and price.
Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation is one of several major Japanese companies that has invested in Japan's advanced semiconductor manufacturing company "Rapidus". The government-backed chipmaker plans to start mass production of advanced semiconductors in 2027. Rapidus was established in 2022 and was announced by the Japanese government last yearUS$65 billion chip and artificial intelligence industry boost plancore carrier.
Reuters reported last week that Japan's three largest banks planned to provide Rapidus with a total of approximately2 trillion yen (equivalent to $12.9 billion)loan support.
Japan was one of the dominant players in the global semiconductor industry in the 1980s, but has since been overtaken by rivals from Taiwan and South Korea. Jun Sawada pointed out that the Japanese semiconductor industry gradually lost its competitive advantage precisely because of its blind pursuit of low-cost, large-scale production models. This lesson must be learned during this industrial renaissance.
“From an economy of scale perspective, we cannot match Taiwan’s TSMC or South Korea’s Samsung Electronics,” Sawada said in an interview last week. “We should aim toMultiple varieties, small batchesmarket positioning. What he is referring to is a production strategy adopted by some chip manufacturers - producing a wide range of high-specification special-purpose chips at a lower output and obtaining higher premiums with differentiated niche products.
Japan’s chip industry revitalization plan is in step with the relevant measures implemented by the United States to cope with the rapid development of China’s technology and ensure the stability of the chip supply chain.
Sawada Jun said that Japan Telecom and Telephone Corporation hopes that Rapidus can adopt the company's independently developedOptical Innovation Network (IOWN) Technology. This technology uses light to transmit data, and has the advantages of faster transmission speed and lower energy consumption than traditional technology.
Jun Sawada previously served as president of the Japan-U.S. Economic Association until October this year. He pointed out that the policies implemented by former U.S. President Donald Trump also had a positive impact on Japan. Although Japan has many domestic concerns about the U.S. tariff policy, Sawada Jun believes that Japan’s commitment to invest $550 billion in the United States this year is actually a rare market opportunity.
"We can look at this from a positive perspective. Although the cost of tariffs remains high, Japanese companies have also taken this opportunity to enter the US market and seize corresponding market share." He said.
