Foxconn Hires Chip Veteran in Diversification Drive

Mr. Chiang, who is in his mid-70s, will advise on Foxconn’s global semiconductor strategy and technology, reporting directly to Chief Executive

Young Liu

in the newly created role, the company said Tuesday.

“We are grateful to have such a seasoned semiconductor veteran join us at this important juncture in the group’s development,” Mr. Liu said in a statement.

At

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.

, Mr. Chiang was credited with leading technological breakthroughs that helped the company become the world’s largest contract chip maker. He went on to become its co-chief operating officer. Later stints at mainland Chinese rivals proved less successful.

He joins Foxconn as the group’s core electronics assembly business faces some significant challenges, including shrinking global demand for electronic products, Covid-19 related disruptions to its manufacturing operations and rising geopolitical risks.

A recent Covid outbreak in the central Chinese city of Zhengzhou led thousands of workers to abandon the company’s biggest iPhone assembly site, causing major disruption to the production of

Apple Inc.’s

latest models.

Foxconn has made a number of forays into the global semiconductor industry in recent years to support its ambitions to expand into new areas, especially the manufacturing of electric vehicles, including purchasing facilities in the U.S. and investing in a debt-laden Chinese chip conglomerate.

Born in China and educated in Taiwan and the U.S., Mr. Chiang was a longtime technology head at

TSMC.

TSM 3.69%

When

TSMC

jumped to global prominence in 2003 with a groundbreaking method to make smaller chips, the company named Mr. Chiang the lead engineer for the team.

Following his retirement from

TSMC,

Mr. Chiang in 2016 was made an independent director of

Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp.

, China’s largest chip maker. Less than three years later, he briefly joined another China-based semiconductor company, which closed in 2021 after running into financial problems.

In 2020, he was again hired by SMIC—this time as deputy chairman—as part of an effort to bolster China’s chip industry in the face of a U.S. blacklisting campaign and tightening export controls.

The move triggered an immediate dispute, with SMIC’s Co-CEO Liang Mong-song threatening to quit because he wasn’t consulted about the decision. Mr. Chiang had been his former boss on the breakthrough team at TSMC.

Mr. Chiang quit SMIC about a year later. In a July interview with industry information website Computer History Museum, he said working there had been a mistake.

“It was one of the foolish things I’ve done,” Mr. Chiang said.

Last month, Mr. Chiang appeared at a major Foxconn technology event in Taiwan as a guest.

Write to Yang Jie at [email protected]