May

15

Semiconductor factories spared from China’s massive earthquake

Filed Under Semiconductor Industry | Leave a Comment

Chengdu is one of the areas in China with the most concentrated semiconductor companies. Despite the massive 7.8 magnitude earthquake in Sichuan province of China, most semiconductor factories in Chengdu, Sichuan and Chongqing are reportedly mildly affected by the earthquake. For example, Taiwan ProMOS’s 8-inch fab in Chongqing is normal, not even the electricity supply, as claimed by its chairman ML Chen (Ref); SMIC’s 8-inch fab in Chengdu was also barely affected and the production has resumed on the evening of May 12. SMIC even claimed that there would not be any disruption in their monthly supply of 7,000 8-inch wafers(Ref); Intel has a test-and-assembly plant in Chengdu. While the plant has shutdown since the quake happened,

Intel is still conducting a seismic analysis of the earthquake’s impact, so far the damage seems to be minimal and the employees are expected to return on Friday (Ref). Intel reported that the impact on the global IC supply would not be affected since any damaged chips could be replaced relatively quickly from other sources. According to reports, Intel had contacted ASE, Amkor and Siliconware for assistance in replacing the parts (Ref); Unisem, a Malaysian assembly and test company with a factory in Chengdu, also reported there was likewise no major physical damage to the factory (Ref). It seems that most semiconductor plants are solidly built against the earthquake, but definitely not the schools.

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Sep

25

FormFactor picks Singapore

Filed Under Packaging and Testing | Leave a Comment

The semiconductor ecosystem in Singapore gets another boost last week. The world largest probecard supplier FormFactor has announced that it would build a $200 million wafer probecard manufacturing facility in this small silicon island. The facility would be housed at the Tampines district of Singapore (Ref). Tampines, located in the East part of Singapore, is one of the hotbeds of high-tech semiconductor companies, including UMC, SSMC (subsidiary of TSMC), HNS (subsidary of Hitachi), SOITEC, Samsung Siltronic and AFPD (JV of Toshiba and Mashisuta). According to the press, Singapore was chosen due to its highly skilled workforce, favorable IP protection environment, and low operating costs (Ref). Besides all these valid reasons, I think another reason why Singapore was picked was because the island has a large market base for wafer probecards, including pure-play testing companies such as Stats ChipPac, AMKOR, and home grown UTAC and Nepes, as well as mutli-national IDMs such as Micron and STMicroelectronics. I guess semiconductor professionals crunch to support the huge local semiconductor industry will be one of the biggest headache for the EDB (Economic Development Board) of Singapore.

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