New AIM Photonics TAP Facility to be Located at Kodak’s Eastman Business Park

The American Institute for Manufacturing Integrated Photonics (AIM Photonics) named Eastman Business Park (EBP) as the new home of its Test, Assembly and Packaging (TAP) manufacturing facility. The decision secures Rochester’s position as a critical hub for photonics and part of a growing and thriving innovation zone. The site was selected in an open process organized by the state.

The selected site is known as Building 81 and is on Lake Avenue across from the Kodak Research Laboratory. The building is now owned by ON Semiconductor. ON Semiconductor will lease excess clean room, lab and office space for the TAP facility.

With its world-class capabilities; Kodak’s legendary Eastman Business Park was a logical choice for the TAP facility. And there is plenty of room to grow and welcome new companies to the Photonics innovation zone. The site’s location near Kodak Research Laboratories and over 50 acres of developable industrial land provides significant expansion opportunity.

Eastman Business Park was designed for innovation and manufacturing with a wide range of capabilities including:

Custom scaling and manufacturing of novel, electronic and photonic-based materials;
Environmentally responsible materials handling and recovery;
Access to world-class analytical characterization facilities and expertise

Dolores Kruchten, President of Eastman Business Park said, “This spotlights the technology innovation happening at Eastman Business Park today. ON Semiconductor is an important part of the Eastman Business Park ecosystem and a great partner with Kodak, their facilities are the ideal location for the TAP facility. We look forward to collaborating with AIM Photonics, ON Semiconductor and the Rochester area community to build a new technology ecosystem, based on our innovative past and our vision for the future.”

Rinchem Opens New Logistics Facility in Atlanta

Rinchem Company Inc., announces the opening of a new facility in the Atlanta metro area. The warehouse, located at 3195 N. Lanier Parkway in Decatur, Georgia, has 80,000 square feet of storage space. The facility provides access to key markets throughout the south and southwest. It is equipped for a wide variety of industries, from semiconductor to pharmaceutical. The capabilities of the facility can accommodate almost any material need from temperature-control to specific storage requirements.

Reid Rose, Director of Operations for the facility said, "We are excited to be in the area and able to continue to extend Rinchem's national and international supply chain management abilities to new key areas around the United States."

Oppo Plans Industrial Park in Noida

Chinese smartphone maker Oppo continues to bet big on India's booming smartphone market.

This time, the company announced that it will open an industrial park in Greater Noida—one that will include an in-house manufacturing unit for Oppo and will spread over 1,000 acres of land, according to media outlets.

Oppo, which already has a production unit in India, will also be opening a surface-mount technology (SMT) center in February 2017, said Oppo India President Sky Li.

The industrial park is expected to be completed in three years and will entail an investment of ₹1,439.90 crore ($216 million). The facility aims to have a capacity of 50 million units, which could ramp up to 100 million in the future.

Like its rivals, Oppo will shift its focus on "young and fashionable people." To do this, however, the Chinese company—which focuses only on offline market—needs to market its product over online channels and has to learn the price game to beat its competitors.

Li was quoted by the news outlet saying, "Unlike many other companies we do not pursue high volume of shipments or scale of our enterprise…but we focus on creating strong products for users…We are creating a trend for the industry and many are following our footsteps on the selfie functionality. Our positioning (in the market) is correct and precise, and that is giving credit to our market research."

Industry body GSMA said India has already overtaken the United States to become the world's second-largest smartphone market with an installed base of 275 million devices in 2016. The firm forecasts that India will have nearly 1 billion mobile subscribers by 2020.

Sintronic Starts Sapphire Production Line

Diode rectifier seller and CCFL (cold cathode fluorescent lamp) lighting maker Sintronic Technology will set up a polycrystalline sapphire production line in southern Taiwan in first-quarter 2017, with production to begin in the following quarter, according to the company.

To raise funds for constructing the production line, Sintronic will issue 10 million new shares and 3-year zero-interest secured convertible bonds worth NT$300 million (US$9.4 million).

With production cost being 35% lower than that for monocrystalline sapphire, polycrystalline sapphire is mainly used to make covers of smartphone-use fingerprint recognition modules and cameras, Sintronic said. The production line will have monthly capacity of 20,000 5-inch x 5-inch polycrystalline sapphire plates, equivalent to three million covers of fingerprint recognition modules, and will later produce 6-inch x 6-inch units, Sintronic noted.

Sintronic has partnered with China-based China Star Optoelectronics Technology (CSOT) for promoting adoption of CSOT-produced small- to medium-size LTPS TFT-LCD panels mainly by Taiwan-based smartphone vendors or ODMs, with such products being under trial use, Sintronic indicated.

Sintronic has also become a Taiwan sales agent of handset-use chemical materials, including photoresists, ITO film and OCA (optically clear adhesive), for Japan-based makers.

With 99.09% of consolidated revenues coming from diode rectifiers and 0.65% from CCFL lighting currently, Sintronic expects diode rectifiers to account for 40% of 2017 consolidated revenues, chemical materials 40% and LTPS panels 20%.

Sintronic posted consolidated revenues of NT$758 million, gross margin of 14.95%, net operating loss of NT$13.9 million, net loss of NT$31.8 million and net loss per share of NT$0.33 for January-September 2016.

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