TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) is believed to have "inspired" Taiwan's top technocrat to build a government-funded technology research institute in 1973, 12 years before Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) founder Morris Chang (張忠謀), who was still a Texas Instruments veteran at the time, relocated from Texas to Taipei to join the organization and lead Taiwan's chip industry.
Established in 1966, Seoul-based KIST was tasked to help South Korea become a leader in information and communication technologies, with generous research funding from the government. "Chip War" author Chris Miller wrote in his book that the U.S. government had helped to fund the creation of the institute, which recruited a large number of Koreans from leading U.S. universities. Later, the U.S. provided a market and top technologies to Korea amid U.S.-Japan trade tensions in the 1980s.
Asiatic Research Institute of Korea University Professor Son Key-young talked about the story back in the early 1970s, when Taiwan's then Minister of Economic Affairs Sun Yun-suan (孫運璿), an engineer-turned-politician, visited KIST. He was said to be inspired to set up a government-funded technology research institute not subject to congressional supervision and regulatory restrictions to uphold autonomy.
During his speech at a cultural exchange event jointly hosted by the Korean Mission in Taipei and National Chengchi University on Friday (Dec. 8), Professor Son said Sun visited KIST four times: 1970, 1972, 1974, and 1976. He believed Sun "was inspired to build up the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) in Hsinchu," which is known for incubating companies like TSMC and United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC) in the semiconductor sector.
Morris Chang founded TSMC in 1987, with the support of some capital raised by top Taiwanese government officials at the time, Son said. The Korean professor said the contributions of Sun, Chang, and Shih Chin-tay (史欽泰), who helped run ITRI, together made a lasting impact on Taiwan's economy.