China embraces RISC-V chips as TSMC pumps US$100b into US

Agencies

China reportedly plans to encourage the use of open-source RISC-V chips nationwide for the first time, sources said.

The news came as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company unveiled a new US$100 billion (HK$780 billion) investment plan in the United States.

China's policy guidance on boosting the use of RISC-V chips could be released as soon as this month, although the final date could change, the sources said.

RISC-V is an open-source technology that is used to design a range of less-sophisticated chips, from those in smartphones to CPUs for artificial intelligence servers.

It competes globally with proprietary and more commonly used chip architecture technology including x86, dominated by US firms Intel and Advanced Micro Devices, and Arm, developed by SoftBank-owned Arm.

Hong Kong, too is pressing ahead with open-source technology and the city is to host the first International Young Scientist Forum on Artificial Intelligence to promote research of AI technology, including open-source RISC-V chip architecture.

Meanwhile, TSMC, the world's top producer of AI chips, plans to invest an additional US$100 billion in US plants that will boost its chip output on American soil and support US President Donald Trump's goal of increasing domestic manufacturing.

TSMC chief executive C C Wei Chung Ching joined Trump at the White House to unveil the company's vision for expanding a US footprint that got its start in 2020 during the president's first term. Trump said the move means "the most powerful AI chips in the world will be made right here in America."

As envisioned, the spending marks one of the largest outlays by a foreign firm in US manufacturing. The spending adds to US$65 billion in planned TSMC investments in the US and would eventually bring its American presence to a half-dozen plants for advanced wafer fabrication and a couple more for advanced packaging.

In other news, Tencent's (0700) Yuanbao AI chatbot passed DeepSeek to become the most downloaded iPhone app in China this week, highlighting the intensifying domestic competition.

Tencent's app integrates its in-house Hunyuan artificial intelligence tech alongside DeepSeek's R1 reasoning model and has taken over at a time of acute interest and competition around AI in the country. Three of the top five most downloaded free apps are AI bots, with ByteDance's Doubao joining Tencent and DeepSeek.