Eight Japanese Companies Including Sony and Mitsubishi Invest 5 Trillion Yen in Semiconductors

According to news on July 9, 2024, due to optimism about the expansion of the AI and carbon reduction markets, eight Japanese companies - Sony, Mitsubishi ElectrIC, Rohm, Toshiba, Kioxia, Renesas, Rapidus, and Fuji Electric - will invest 5 trillion yen in semiconductors by 2029. This investment will be used to increase production of power semiconductors, image sensors, logic semiconductors, and other products. Sony, specifically, plans to invest approximately 1.6 trillion yen between 2021 and 2026 to increase production of CMOS image sensors and other products, with plans to build a new factory in Kumamoto Prefecture. Additionally, in response to the anticipated growth of AI data centers and the electric vehicle market, Japanese companies are successively increasing production of power semiconductors. Toshiba and Rohm together plan to invest about 380 billion yen to boost production of power semiconductors, while Mitsubishi Electric aims to increase its SiC power semiconductor production capacity to five times the 2022 level by 2026, investing approximately 100 billion yen to build a new factory in Kumamoto Prefecture.