The Economist.
In the 1980s, Taiwan was still living under military dictatorship.
Poverty was widespread.
Taiwan was a strange place to me when I first went there in 1985.
Morris Chang was 54 at the time.
He'd grown up in mainland China and spent his adult life in America.
But his decision to move to Taiwan would transform the island's industrial fortunes.
The Prime Minister of Taiwan had the foresight to start a semiconductor development project in Taiwan.
Chang was invited to head up that initiative.
At the time, I had already worked in the industry for 30 years,
and I had already been the head of the largest semiconductor operation business in the world, Texas Instruments.
He soon set up a rival firm, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, or TSMC.
Cheng invested heavily in R&D as he sought to catch up with
and overtake firms at the cutting edge of global chip manufacturing.
It was a long slog, but it paid off.
Today, TSMc completely dominates the industry.
Their fabs in Taiwan produce 90% of the world's leading edge chips.
There's just one small snag.
In a show of force, China sent a dozen warships and over 70 military aircraft in drills encircling Taiwan.
Taiwan famously sits on a geopolitical fault line, and that's not all.