Big iPhone Parts Maker Hit By Virus Critical Delay

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) a critical partner of Apple, has been hit by a Computer Virus with several of their plants forced to close down.

It is not clear at this time which factories were hit but there is a real possibility that the new iPhone due in late September could be affected by the closedown as these factories manufacture the main processor for the iPhone.

TSMC has grown to become the largest independent semiconductor foundry in the world, with profits last year of $11.6 billion.

A critical partner for the launch of the new iPhone the Company is able to volume produce of 7mm chips, which will drive performance while limiting energy usage in the new iPhones.

Over the weekend the Company disclosed that a computer virus was affecting part of its production and that it is expected to impact 3% of its third-quarter 2018 revenues.

“TSMC expects this incident to cause shipment delays and additional costs,” said the world’s top foundry service provider in an update today about the impact of virus infection that it first reported on Saturday.

“We estimate the impact to third quarter revenue to be about three percent, and impact to gross margin to be about one percentage point,” the company said.

TSMC said the virus outbreak occurred on the evening of August 3, which affected a number of computer systems and fab tools in Taiwan. It said the degree of infection varied by fab and it contained the problem and found a solution.

It said most of its customers have been notified of this incident, and it is working closely with customers on their wafer delivery schedule. The details will be communicated with each customer individually over the next few days, it said.

This virus outbreak occurred due to mis operation during the software installation process for a new tool, which caused a virus to spread once the tool was connected to the company’s computer network, TSMC said.

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David Richards

David Richards has been writing about technology for more than 30 years. A former Fleet Street journalist, he wrote the Award Winning Series on the Federated Ships Painters + Dockers Union for the Bulletin that led to a Royal Commission. He is also a Logie Winner for Outstanding Contribution To TV Journalism with a story called The Werribee Affair. In 1997, he built the largest Australian technology media company and prior to that the third largest PR company that became the foundation company for Ogilvy PR. Today he writes about technology and the impact on both business and consumers.