Digitimes said that the outfit has begun to start to train the senior staff that will be stationed at the new facility.

A team of 200-300 employees from TSMC's 8-inch fab in Shanghai will shift to the new 12-inch plant in Nanjing, and are training at the Taiwan-based foundry's headquarters.

TSMC is on track to complete the construction of its new 12-inch plant in Nanjing, China, which will be ready for 16nm chip production in 2018, the sources said.

Roger Luo, president for TSMC Nanjing, was quoted saying that the equipment move-in will take place at TSMC's Nanjing plant in the second half of 2017.

The new 12-inch facility is set to begin pilot production in the first half of 2018 followed by volume production in the second half of the year, according to Luo.

TSMC's Nanjing fab will directly enter 16nm FinFET chip production with target production capacity of 20,000 wafers monthly, Digitimes said.