MediaTek Hires Former TSMC Executive to Accelerate AI Chip Packaging
Taiwanese chip designer MediaTek has appointed former TSMC executive Douglas Yu as a part-time adviser as it steps up advanced packaging work and expands into the AI chip market. The hire signals a strategic shift, MediaTek is no longer just a mobile chip company. It is now actively competing for the most lucrative contracts in the AI semiconductor space.
Yu joined TSMC in 1994 and retired in 2025, holding a range of roles in backend research and development. He played a key part in developing TSMC’s advanced packaging technologies, including its CoWoS, Chip on Wafer on Substrate. That technology is central to how the world’s most powerful AI chips are built today.
CoWoS is a key chip packaging technology widely used in AI chips, including Nvidia chips. Mastering it, therefore, puts MediaTek in a stronger position to compete directly for AI chip design service contracts.
Yu, known inside TSMC as one of the “six knights,” played a central role in developing CoWoS and InFO, two of the foundry’s most important advanced packaging technologies. His arrival at MediaTek is accordingly seen as a major internal morale boost, according to industry sources.
In a statement, MediaTek said it looks forward to leveraging Yu’s experience to support exploration and roadmap planning for future advanced packaging technologies, as well as to guide R&D and investment strategy in packaging-related products associated with TSMC.
The timing is no coincidence. MediaTek’s most critical battle today is securing Google AI ASIC design service orders, where it faces off against Broadcom, whose market capitalisation is more than ten times MediaTek’s. Advanced packaging expertise could be the deciding factor.
Moreover, the financial ambition is clear. Last week, MediaTek said it expects to generate multiple billions of dollars in revenue from its AI accelerator ASIC chips by 2027. Bringing in a TSMC packaging legend adds significant credibility to that target.
Industry sources note that packaging will increasingly determine the outcome of competition in AI chip design. For MediaTek, hiring Douglas Yu is therefore not just a personnel decision, it is a strategic declaration. The company is going all-in on AI chip packaging, and it now has one of the industry’s most respected architects to help lead the way.
