April 8 (Reuters) - Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (2330.TW) could face a penalty of $1 billion or more to settle a U.S. export control investigation over a chip it made that ended up inside a Huawei AI processor, according to two people familiar with the matter.
The U.S. Department of Commerce has been investigating the world’s biggest contract chipmaker’s work for China-based Sophgo, the sources said. The design company’s TSMC-made chip matched one found in Huawei’s high-end Ascend 910B artificial intelligence processor, according to the people, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.
The issue is a TSMC-made chip ended up inside a Huawei processor. They’re not allowed to make chips for Huawei or other US-sanctioned entities since they use US tech inside their foundries.
What happened here is that TSMC made chips for another Chinese company that gave them to Huawei (and is now on the sanctioned list as well as a result, but wasn’t when TSMC made the chips). The problem for TSMC is if the US determines they should have reasonably known there was a risk the company they made the chips for would give them to Huawei.