美光桃园工会24小时罢工按计划开始，台湾半导体业首次罢工，但无停产确认

TAIPEI -- A Micron Technology labor union launched Taiwan's first-ever strike in the semiconductor industry on Thursday amid a dispute over how to share the windfall profits from the artificial intelligence boom.
The union representing Micron workers in the northern city of Taoyuan is calling on the leading U.S. memory chipmaker to follow the example of South Korean rivals SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics by offering a regular profit-sharing scheme for its employees in Taiwan.
The Taoyuan union told Nikkei Asia that the company did not address the profit-sharing proposal it raised during multiple negotiations mediated by the Taoyuan City government.
The union began its 24-hour strike in front of Micron's Taoyuan facility at 9 a.m. local time on Thursday.
Micron has been locked in a monthslong negotiation with employees at its operations in Taoyuan and Taichung, which are represented by two separate unions. Taiwan is a key production hub for the American company, accounting for over 60% of its output of dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chips.
On Wednesday afternoon, Micron said it had reached an agreement with the Taichung union on a plan that would significantly increase employee salaries. Taichung, in central Taiwan, is Micron's production center for high-bandwidth memory (HBM), a vital component in chips for artificial intelligence computing.
The escalating tensions between workers and memory chipmakers come amid an unprecedented shortage of memory chips due to the explosive demand for AI infrastructure. Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron have all reported record earnings in recent quarters.
Both Micron unions in Taiwan have seen their membership surge in a matter of months, from slightly more than 100 people to a total of more than 13,000.
"The company representatives said our average salary is higher than Micron's peers, but guess what? Our bonuses are much lower than those in South Korea," a manager working for Micron told Nikkei Asia. "They [company representatives] even emphasized that the company built more toilet stalls for us this year."
The immediate impact of the Taoyuan strike on production is not yet clear. Operations there mostly concern manufacturing DRAM chips, while the Taichung operation is in charge of HBM production as well as other advanced chip packaging and testing capabilities.
DRAM is the foundation not only for HBM but also for LPDDR and DDR memory, which are also used in AI computing applications. Micron last week opened its second advanced packaging plant in Taichung.
Micron has about 3,000 employees in Taoyuan, of whom about 2,400 are union members. In Taichung, the company employs about 12,300 people, including roughly 11,000 union members.
In September, Micron offered employees an additional bonus of 1 million New Taiwan dollars ($30,700) on top of its original package in an attempt to resolve the dispute, but this did not satisfy union demands for more structural adjustments, including pay rises and a profit-sharing framework.
Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te also publicly said he hopes both Micron and its employees can reach a mutually acceptable solution that benefits both the company and its workers, as well as the overall labor environment in Taiwan.
Earlier this year, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) employees in Taiwan also openly discussed the possibility of unionization and considered a strike amid growing discontent over how the company's profits were shared among staff.
Micron said it remains committed to maintaining open and constructive dialogue with the labor union at its Taoyuan operations in Taiwan, with the aim of finding a mutually acceptable solution.