NTT CEO urges Japan to target specialized chips over mass production

Jun Sawada, chairman of Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT), said Japan should focus on niche, specialized chip production instead of competing with industry giants on scale and price.

NTT is among several Japanese companies invested in Rapidus, a government-backed chipmaker at the center of Tokyo’s US$65 billion plan to revive the country’s semiconductor and AI sectors.

Rapidus plans to begin mass production of advanced semiconductors in 2027.

Japan’s top three banks are expected to lend about 2 trillion yen (US$12.9 billion) to Rapidus.

Sawada told Reuters that Japan lost its edge in the 1980s by pursuing high-volume, low-cost manufacturing, and should now aim for “high mix, low volume” strategies to create highly specialized chips.

He added that NTT would like Rapidus to use its IOWN technology, which transmits data using light for greater speed and efficiency.

🔗 Source: Reuters

🧠 Food for thought

Implications, context, and why it matters.

In July 2025, Rapidus ran its first 2nm gate-all-around (GAA) transistor. Early test wafers met expected electrical characteristics, but mass production has not started, so the work remains in research and development (R&D) 1.
Pilot production starts in April 2025. That leaves about two years for debugging and yield work before the 2027 mass production goal 2.
By Q1 2026, the Process Design Kit (PDK) will reach initial customers for prototyping at the IIM-1 facility in Chitose, Rapidus’s initial factory 3 4. Turnaround cycles of 15 to 50 days demand quick iterations with PDK updates, and a mature design ecosystem ties to profitability through fiscal 2031 3 4.
Siemens backs design support with a strategic collaboration for design software and tools. Industry analysis says the company must speed Electronic Design Automation (EDA) partnerships with Synopsys, Cadence to support 2nm GAA designs with backside power delivery, which routes power on the reverse side to cut resistance and boost performance 5 4.
Keysight, a test and measurement company, works on parametric testing with root-cause analysis. That helps fabless chip companies, which design chips but outsource manufacturing, and supports intellectual property (IP) providers in high-precision analog, mixed-signal, or custom logic where Design-Manufacturing Co-Optimization matters most. Design-Manufacturing Co-Optimization means co-designing process and product to improve outcomes 6.
RUMS-driven single-wafer turnaround, a quick-turn model for flexibility and speed, suits specialized application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) work for customers that want rapid prototyping cycles over high-volume commodity production 5 1.