Japan's Rapidus lands $1.7B to chase 2nm chip production by 2027

Japan's fledgling foundry biz Rapidus has secured funding of $1.7 billion to help it progress to mass production of 2nm semiconductors by 2027, making it a potential rival for Taiwan's TSMC.

The startup silicon manufacturer has completed a funding round delivering ¥267.6 billion (equivalent to $1.7 billion) from the Japanese government and private sector companies.

¥100 billion of the funding came from the Information-technology Promotion Agency (IPA), an independent administrative body under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI).

The remaining ¥167.6 billion has been sourced from 32 companies including Canon, Fujitsu, NTT, SoftBank, Development Bank of Japan, and Sony Group.

Rapidus was founded in 2022 with the aim of revitalizing Japan's fading semiconductor industry, and has signed up help from IBM and Belgian-based R&D organization Imec (Interuniversity Microelectronics Center) for the development of the technology required to reach ...