SEMICONDUCTOR
UPDATE
JUNE 2007
McIlvaine Company
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Advanced Photonix Announces Opening of Semiconductor Microfabrication Facility
Powerchip Investing in Chip Testing, May Sell Macronix
Samsung Electronics Produces 300-mm Wafers for NAND Flash Memory in U.S.
Motorola Consolidates to Tempe
AMDs Operating System Research Center in Dresden Celebrates First Year Anniversary
European Groups Join 'Fab Club'
Taiwan's ProMOS to Build 12-inch Wafer Plant with 70,000 units/mth Capacity
New UMC R&D lab Zeroes in on Advanced Nanometer Tech
IBM, Chartered Semiconductor, Samsung, Infineon, Freescale Collaborate On 32nm Chip Development
Advanced Photonix Announces Opening of Semiconductor Microfabrication Facility
Advanced Photonix, Inc. has announced the completion of the company's new multi-million dollar, 5,000 square foot microfabrication facility for R&D and manufacturing of optoelectronic semiconductors. The space has a clean room, which is temperature-controlled, humidity-controlled and has a ventilation system that can replace all the air in the room in less than five minutes.
The facility consolidates the company's microfabrication operations, including its California and Wisconsin cleanrooms, to one centralized and world-leading facility in Ann Arbor, at its wholly owned subsidiary, Picometrix.
This consolidation was made possible by the acquisition of Picometrix, located in Ann Arbor, Michigan, with API in 2005, and up to $1.2 million of tax incentives provided by the State of Michigan and the City of Ann Arbor. These tax incentives made it economical and competitive to consolidate in Michigan. The State provided a Single Business Tax credit, approved by the Michigan Economic Development Corporation (MEDC), valued at more than $1.1 million over ten years and the City provided a personal property tax abatement of as much as $94,000 over a five-year abatement period. According to a University of Michigan economic analysis, the project is expected to generate more than $44.2 million in personal income for Michigan workers over the life of the tax credit and create 105 direct and indirect jobs over a ten year period.
Powerchip Investing in Chip Testing, May Sell Macronix
Powerchip Semiconductor Corp, the nation's biggest computer memory chipmaker, said it planned to invest NT$2.5 billion (US$75.9 million) to set up a chip testing facility to boost operational efficiency.
The new testing facility is scheduled to start operation in the second quarter of next year, with maximum capacity of 400,000 12-inch wafers a month.
The company plans to increase monthly output slightly to 128,000 12-inch wafers and 37,000 8-inch wafers by the end of this quarter to gain market share.
Part of the planned wafer testing complex will be used as the company's research and development center, with a staff of about 500 engineers. For the full year, the DRAM maker aims to expand wafer shipments by 82 percent. It also plans to spend NT$69 billion on new facilities and equipment this year, down from NT$85 billion last year.
Samsung Electronics Produces 300-mm Wafers for NAND Flash Memory in U.S.
Samsung Electronics Co Ltd has announced the opening of the largest 300mm Flash memory wafer plant in Austin, TX.
The fifty-nm-generation 16 Gbit NAND flash memory will be produced in the facility. The company will start the production in the latter half of 2007 and plans to be manufacturing 60,000 units per month by 2008. The amount of the investment was $3.5 billion. It will be one of the biggest semiconductor factories in the United States, with 1,600,000 square feet of facility area.
The new fab will be the city's first to produce semiconductors on a 300mm wafer. The 300mm wafer is 2.25 times larger than the 200mm wafer now used at the first fab. The 12-inch wafer can typically hold about 1,200 standard 256Mb memory chips, compared to about 500 such chips on an eight-inch wafer.
The new facility is located next to the company's existing 200-mm wafer production facility built in 1997. The existing facility will also continue to produce DRAM for computers and mobile devices.
The production facilities in Austin are the company's only factories outside Korea. Samsung already operates 15 semiconductor production lines in the facility.
Russia is collaborating with a party known only as the "Kedah Group" to construct a 300mm wafer fab at the city of Nizhny Novgorod. Details are sparse but the project was included in a presentation by Alexander Kalinin, deputy chairman for the Russian Federal Fund for Electronics.
The fund has earmarked $700 million as a grant to support Kedah Group in the construction of wafer fabrication facilities capable of 8-inch and 12-inch manufacture at up to 30,000 wafer starts per month. The facility would manufacture circuits using 0.18m down to 90nm manufacturing processes, according to Kalinin.
The constituent members of the Kedah Group are not clear at this time. Kedah is a Malaysian state, which includes Kulim where there is a technology park. The Kulim Hi-tech Park (KHTP) tenants include Silterra, Intel, Infineon, Fuji Electric and AIC Semiconductor.
Silterra is working with Belgium-based research house IMEC on a 90nm CMOS process with plans to scale it down to 65nm. The 90nm process is expected to be ready for production in the second half of 2008 and Silterra has said the process would pave the way for alliances between Silterra and other foundries as well as the company's migration to 300mm manufacturing.
A leading-edge 300mm wafer fab typically costs in excess of $3 billion to fully equip. Even a lagging fab could easily cost in excess of $1 billion. No explanation was given on how the fab would manufacture using both 8-inch wafers and 12-inch diameter wafers, or migrate from one size to the other.
Motorola Consolidates to Tempe
Motorola will move its Home and Networks Mobility operations in south Chandler to Tempe early next year, consolidating most of its once sprawling Valley businesses at one location.
The Chandler business, located on a 152-acre complex will move to leased space at 2900 S. Diablo Way, Tempe, where the company’s Embedded Communications Computing unit is located. The Chandler plant, which was built in 1985, will be sold.
The move is the latest step in Motorola’s long-term downsizing in the Valley. In 1999, the company spun off its analog semiconductor operations to a new company, ON Semiconductor. Then it sold its military communications business in Scottsdale, to General Dynamics in 2001. Finally, the company spun off the remainder of its semiconductor business into a new company, Freescale Semiconductor, in 2003.
AMDs Operating System Research Center in Dresden Celebrates First Year Anniversary
One year after opening, AMD’s Dresden-based Operating System Research Center (OSRC) has become a successful member of the worldwide AMD research and development (R&D) network, and currently employees more than 20 engineers and support staff.
By acting as the bridge between the operating system (OS) development community and the worldwide AMD processor design community, the OSRC plays an increasing role in ensuring next-generation AMD products and solutions enable the most advanced OS and application features.
The research center specializes in OS virtualization, memory management, multi-core scheduling and performance measuring to make better use of future multi-core architectures. One of the first opportunities for the Dresden team has been the optimization of operating systems for the upcoming quad-core AMD Opteron™ Processor ‘Barcelona’.
European Groups Join 'Fab Club'
Two of the three companies that have joined the Fab Owners Association (FOA) are based in Europe and brings the number of semiconductor and MEMS manufacturing facilities owned by member companies to over 60.
Austriamicrosystems AG and German foundry X-Fab (Erfurt) become full members of the FOA, as does Avago Technologies, while the National Grid, the strategic economic development program sponsor for upstate New York, becomes an associate member.
The Association's other device maker members include NXP Semiconductor, AMI Semiconductor, Freescale Semiconductor, Cypress Semiconductor, Spansion, Intersil, Delphi Microelectronics Center, Fairchild Semiconductor, International Rectifier, Jazz Semiconductor, MagnaChip Semiconductor, Micrel Semiconductor, Microchip Technology, ON Semiconductor and Skyworks Solutions.
Together, they represent about 1.1 million eight - inch- equivalent monthly wafer starts and over $27 billion in annual revenue.
Taiwan's ProMOS to Build 12-inch Wafer Plant with 70,000 units/mth Capacity
Memory chipmaker ProMOS Technologies Inc. will build a fourth 12-inch wafer plant with a monthly capacity of 70,000 units on the island by the end of this year for US$2.5 billion.
'The new wafer plant will have a monthly capacity of 70,000 units. Whether the new facilities will be used to produce dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chips or flash chips will depend on market conditions,' ProMOS spokesman Ben Tseng said.
The construction of the Houli plant in central Taiwan is expected to be completed in 12 to 13 months.
The new production site will use 60-nanometre process technology. Currently, ProMOS operates two 12-inch wafer plants and a third is under construction. Including the fourth one, the total monthly 12-inch wafer production capacity is expected to rise to about 200,000 units.
ProMOS is also building an eight-inch wafer plant in Chongqing, central China.
The company is one of three local microchip manufacturers authorized by the Taiwan government to build an eight-inch wafer plant in China since 2002.
New UMC R&D lab Zeroes in on Advanced Nanometer Tech
United Microelectronics Corp. has opened a new research and development facility in Taiwan. The launch was held at the Tainan Science Park to coincide with the foundry's 27th anniversary celebrations.
The new R&D center will focus on advanced nanometer technologies for 300mm manufacturing. It is expected to employ 1,000 people, mostly R&D engineers, when it becomes fully operational. The 10-story building facility occupies nearly 64,560 sq. ft. (6,000 square meters) featuring independent cleanroom R&D areas, as well as restaurants and a recreation center for employees.
IBM, Chartered Semiconductor, Samsung, Infineon, Freescale Collaborate On 32nm Chip Development
Diversified technology company International Business Machines Corp. (IBM) announced that the company and its Common Platform technology partners Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing and Samsung Electronics Ltd. (SSNLF.PK) signed several semiconductor process development and manufacturing agreements with its joint-development alliance partners Freescale Semiconductor and Infineon Technologies AG. The partners intend to pool their combined expertise to design, develop and manufacture the advanced technology through 2010. Freescale had announced its membership in the alliance on January 23.
IBM said that the joint development deals will now include 32-nanometer or nm bulk complementary metal oxide semiconductor or CMOS process technologies, along with the joint development of process design kits or PDKs to support that technology. The alliance partners will produce 32nm chips, building on the earlier joint development and manufacturing agreements at 90nm, 65nm and 5nm. The new technologies could be used by the partners as well as other companies to solve real life problems in the fields of medicine, communications, transportation and security.
As the manufacturers of the Common Platform technology, IBM, Chartered and Samsung will be able to use the jointly developed 32nm process technology and design kits to synchronize their manufacturing facilities. This will provide the companies with the flexibility to produce nearly identical chips for their respective high-volume OEM clients, who require a multi-sourcing model and expect early access to the process technology.
IBM stated that the 32nm cooperation will also include the joint development of an enablement package, which will support the most common design tools that will allow customers to utilize the full potential of this advanced technology for their specific products. Similar to the previous developments, the 32nm development activities will be conducted at IBM's 300 mm semiconductor fabrication facility in East Fishkill, New York.
McIlvaine Company,
Northfield, IL 60093-2743
Tel: 847-784-0012; Fax: 847-784-0061;
E-mail: editor@mcilvainecompany.com;
Web site: www.mcilvainecompany.com