PSMC Negotiates 10-20% More Price Hikes for 2027 as Q3 Margin Hits 48%

For data-center buyers, the point is that AI demand is now lifting prices well away from the leading edge: PSMC tied its capacity squeeze to AI server buildouts, and the advanced-packaging site it is scouting targets CoWoS interposers, a bottleneck for AI accelerators.

President Martin Chu said PSMC holds a highly optimistic view of 2027 revenue and profit provided AI momentum stays strong. The company blamed the squeeze on AI server buildouts, which have pulled memory makers toward high-bandwidth memory (HBM) and left mature DDR3 and DDR4 DRAM supply tight.

Legacy DRAM and packaging expansion

Chairman Brian Shieh said PSMC is poised to be the world's only memory maker still producing legacy DRAM from DDR1 to DDR3, on 63-nanometer to 20-nanometer processes with a lifecycle of 10 to 15 years. Chu said niche DRAM foundry pricing should stay robust, with no sign of a downward adjustment. PSMC described recent mild weakness in DDR3 prices as a temporary supply influx from an enterprise PC refresh cycle.

PSMC is also scouting a site in Taiwan, Japan or Singapore for a small-scale facility focused on advanced packaging: post-wafer-finish services, the interposers used in chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) packaging, and integrated passive devices (IPD). Shieh said IPD demand could reach as many as 50,000 wafers a month in the second half of next year, against current capacity of 10,000 wafers per month.

What is not confirmed yet

The 2027 increase is still under negotiation, so the final figure may differ from the 10% to 20% range. Shieh said PSMC wants customers to fund 30% to 60% of new line expansions through leasing or prepayments, citing Micron Technology, which fully funded equipment for PSMC's Taiwan post-wafer-finish expansion through prepayments. The location of the new facility and its size beyond "small-scale" have not been announced.