Jul 26, 2024 – 9.00am
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From the business lounge at Chitose City Airport, in Japan’s northernmost island Hokkaido, the view is dominated by giant cranes building the steel skeleton of what will become Japan’s largest advanced semiconductor facility, Rapidus.
The Japanese government is hoping that Rapidus will be a big part of its answer to California’s Silicon Valley and help revive the dwindling fortunes of its semiconductor industry. During the 1990s, Japan was the world’s leading maker of semiconductor chips, but in the years since rapidly lost its edge to Taiwan and the US.