Japan’s Rapidus is said likely to miss mass production deadline

The Rapidus Analysis Center and the IIM-1 Innovative Integration for Manufacturing foundry in Chitose, Hokkaido | BLOOMBERG

Nov 10, 2026

Japanese government-backed startup Rapidus has fallen behind schedule on its high-stakes pledge to mass produce cutting-edge chips by March 2028 and may no longer be able to make that deadline.

The startup, which has received billions of dollars’ worth of public funds, has yet to successfully produce a key type of advanced memory that’s an essential component of all processors, people familiar with the matter said. Rapidus has yet to produce functioning static random access memory cells, or SRAM, a critical step that needed to be done by the summer to manufacture 2-nanometer chips in time, they said.

Engineers are under intense pressure to pick up the pace, but the failure to meet that technological milestone means the company is at least months behind schedule, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the information isn’t public.

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