TSMC announced that after four months and two rounds of competition, a team from Yuan Ze University took first place in the first TSMC IC Layout Contest to win a cash prize of NT$200,000.

TSMC launched its first IC Layout Contest to encourage Taiwan university students to join the field of IC layout, and gained an enthusiastic response from institutions across the country, attracting young talent to the semiconductor industry and providing real-world knowledge to the next generation of engineers and scholars.

TSMC said that a total of 1,000 applicants and 150 advising professors from 35 Taiwan universities signed up for the competition. By teaming up with Open Innovation Platform Cloud Alliance members Cadence and Microsoft to hold the contest on TSMC’s Virtual Design Environment (VDE), TSMC was able to host four months of competition without limitations from location or university IT facilities. Besides providing contestants from around Taiwan with seven hours of online training courses, TSMC made the VDE available to students for 12 weeks for hands-on practice. In addition, TSMC held three training seminars in North, Central, and South Taiwan, offering opportunities to learn about innovations in IC layout in advanced processes from experts in the field, and further aligning classroom knowledge with industry needs. A total of 500 contestants formed 250 teams of two members, and 17 teams were selected as finalists in the preliminary round of competition. Finalists were invited to further intensive training at TSMC’s R&D center in Hsinchu, Taiwan before the final round on January 15, 2020.