Since the 2020s, the Japanese government has been actively implementing policies to strengthen its semiconductor supply chain, not only in response to geopolitical risks stemming from the U.S. Biden administration’s export restrictions on China but also from an industrial policy perspective. Among these, the supply chain strengthening measures under the ‘Economic Security Promotion Act’(enacted in May 2021), the ‘Semiconductor and Digital Industry Strategy’(announced in June 2021, and revised in June 2023), and the “Framework for Strengthening the AI and Semiconductor Industry Infrastructure” (announced in November 2024) are expected to bring about a major transformation in Japan’s semiconductor supply chain structure.

This study focuses on the Japanese government’s semiconductor industry revival strategy. First, it evaluates Japan’s semiconductor competitiveness based on global market share by product and manufacturing process, aiming to identify complementary areas from the perspective of the semiconductor ecosystems between Korea and Japan. Second, it focuses on the Japan’s Next-Generation Semiconductor Project(Rapidus) within Japan’s semiconductor revival strategy, aiming to identify areas that could broaden the horizon for industrial cooperation between Korea and Japan. Third, it analyzes Japan’s semiconductor supply chain structure from the perspective of external dependency to identify areas for cooperation between the Korean and Japanese governments in stabilizing the semiconductor supply chain. Finally, it examines the current state of semiconductor industry cooperation between Korea and Japan, focusing particularly on trade and investment relations, and conducts a quantitative analysis of the business activities and performance of Japanese semiconductor companies operating in Korea.

The analysis results can be summarized as follows. First, in analyzing Japan’s semiconductor industry competitiveness, it was confirmed that Japan maintains competitiveness in key semiconductor products—memory semiconductors, power semiconductors, CMOS image sensors, and MCUs—and semiconductor manufacturing equipment—thermal processing equipment, coaters/developers, cleaning equipment, mask inspection equipment, CD-SEM, and the semiconductor materials market, despite the absence of notable fabless companies and foundries in the semiconductor design and manufacturing sectors. Particularly in semiconductor materials, Japanese companies dominate not only the front-end process materials market, including silicon wafers, photoresists, high-purity cleaning solutions, CMP slurries, insulating film materials, target materials, and etching gases, but also the back-end process materials market, encompassing package substrate materials, dicing materials, bonding materials, and encapsulation materials. Second, it is no exaggeration to say that the success of Rapidus holds the key to Japan’s semiconductor industry revival strategy. Current challenges facing Rapidus include funding issues, mass production of 2-nanometer-class semiconductors, customer acquisition, and talent recruitment. Third, analyzing the changes in Japan’s semiconductor supply chain structure by examining the input structure of Japan’s semiconductor industry and the import structure of semiconductors during the period from 2018 to 2024, it revealed that Japan has a high degree of external dependence not only in the IC sector, but also in the semiconductor materials and raw materials sector. However, it was confirmed that in some material items, such as industrial plastic products and glass processing products, the degree of external dependence is low and the domestic production rate is very high. Moreover, Japan’s semiconductor import structure shows a very high dependence on Taiwan for finished semiconductor products, and for certain semiconductor raw materials, such as silicon carbide(China, 89%), phosphoric acid/polyphosphoric acid(China, 90%), fluorspar(China, 73%), hydrogen fluoride (China, 97%), and pyrophosphoric acid(Vietnam, 99%) exhibit extremely high import dependency on specific countries. Fourth, semiconductor industry cooperation between Korea and Japan was examined primarily through Korea’s imports from Japan and Japan’s direct investment in Korea. First, regarding Korea’s semiconductor imports from Japan, the impact of Japan’s export restrictions in 2019 was not significant, confirming that mutual dependence between semiconductor companies in both countries persists. Regarding Japanese companies’ direct investment in Korea, since the 2010s, investment in the chemical and electrical/electronics sectors has accounted for 60.0% of total manufacturing investment. This indicates that the Korean government’s foreign direct investment attraction strategy has been effective in attracting Japanese capital and technology. Furthermore, it was confirmed that Japanese chemical companies without major customers in Japan are expanding the establishment of parts and materials factories within Korea. However, quantitative analysis of 43 Japanese semiconductor materials, parts, and equipment companies operating in Korea also revealed the following characteristics and limitations of Japanese direct investment in Korea. First, investment is concentrated in semiconductor materials and manufacturing equipment. In technology cooperation, collaboration generally involves Korean conglomerates combining their production capacity with Japanese technology. Second, while sales of Japanese semiconductor companies in Korea increased by an average of about 20% annually from 2020 to 2023, and the number of employees also grew by about 15%, there was no statistically significant change in tangible and intangible assets. Third, it was confirmed that the economic activities of Japanese semiconductor companies in Korea positively influenced the business performance (sales) of Korean semiconductor companies. Based on these analytical findings, this study proposes two areas for Korea-Japan semiconductor cooperation: joint development of back-end packaging technology within Japan and collaboration in the AI semiconductor sector.

국문요약

제1장 서론
1. 연구 배경
2. 연구 목적 및 구성
3. 선행연구 검토 및 본 연구의 차별성

제2장 일본 반도체산업의 경쟁력
1. 일본 반도체산업의 성장과 쇠락
2. 일본의 반도체 세계시장 점유율
3. 소결

제3장 일본의 반도체 전략 추진 현황과 과제
1. 기본전략
2. 반도체 제조기반 확충
3. 차세대 반도체 프로젝트
4. 인재육성ㆍ인프라 지원
5. 소결: 평가와 전망

제4장 일본의 반도체 공급망 구조 변화 분석
1. 분석 배경 및 방법론
2. 일본 반도체산업의 투입 구조 변화
3. 일본 반도체산업의 수입 구조 변화
4. 소결

제5장 한일 간 반도체 산업협력 현황
1. 반도체 산업협력
2. 일본 반도체 관련 기업의 대한국 공급망 연계와 기업 성과
3. 소결: 요약 및 시사점

제6장 결론 및 시사점
1. 일본 반도체산업의 경쟁력
2. 일본의 반도체 부흥 전략
3. 일본의 반도체 공급망 구조
4. 한일 간 반도체 산업협력

참고문헌

Executive Summary