Taiwan IP Updates  ¡V January 2025

By Lyndon 

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New Draft Amendment to Taiwan Patent Act

The Taiwan Intellectual Property Office (TIPO) announced the Draft Amendment to Certain Articles of the Patent Act on September 24, 2024.  The aim of the Amendment is to respond to the growth of emerging digital industries and the increasing diversity in image design through digital technology.  The Draft Amendment focuses on two main areas as follows:

1. Relaxing several restrictions on design patent protection by taking into account the emergence of digital technology by allowing the scope of design protection to include image designs using digital technology and lifting the restriction that image designs must apply to articles.  Also, a consolidated application for similar designs will be allowed by amending the relevant stipulations on revisions, invalidation proceedings and other related matters.  The grace period will be extended from six months to twelve months within which the applicant can file a design application irrespective of the prior publication or disclosure of the design.  Design divisional applications will have the time limit extended to three months from the receipt of either the approval of a design application or a reexamination decision.
2. For any disputes over the right to apply for a patent and patent rights, civil procedures will be exclusively used for their resolution.  This is a change from previous ideas under consideration such as an Appeal and Dispute Review Committee.  However, as this is still in draft form there may be further adjustments after discussions about how to deal with the various issues raised from this new Amendment.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Forecasts Revenue to Grow 29% in 2025

Driven by robust demand for advanced technologies used in artificial intelligence applications and crypto mining, TSMC expects to see 29% growth in revenue next year.  If that is the case, TSMC would be looking at a 67% share of the world’s foundry market in 2025.  Currently, its share is 64%.  To address concerns about its market dominance, TSMC in July created a new definition of the foundry market, called Foundry 2.0, which includes chip packaging, testing, mask making, and all integrated device manufacturers (IDM) such as Intel Corp., but excludes memorychip makers.  With this broader definition, TSMC has a predicted market share of 36% for 2025, compared to 33% for this year.  Currently, TSMC is fast-tracking production of 3-nanometer, 4-nanometer, and 5-nanometer chips by performing super-hot-run production cycles, the shortest production cycle adopted for rush orders.  The utilization rate of those technology nodes is more than 95%.  The Hsinchu-based chipmaker is expecting to add 70,000 advanced wafers a month next year to existing capacity.  Also, TSMC is planning to double its capacity of advanced packaging technology, or chip-on-wafer-on-silicon (CoWoS), used primarily for Nividia Corp.’s AI chips.  Despite these expansion moves, production will still be lagging behind demand.  Samsung Electronics, TSMCs biggest competitor, is also expected to ramp up production of 2-nanometer next year.  However, Samsung has to address its lower yield rate.  Analysts have projected that the world’s semiconductor industry would grow by 15% in production value to US 782 billion dollars, while the global foundry segment would grow 20% in 2025.

Taiwan’s National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology (NCSIST) Showcases Latest Technology