The Taiwan Memory Co (TMC, 台灣記憶體公司), which was launched by the Ministry of Economic Affairs last week to help reorganize the computer memory chip industry, will seek as much as NT$30 billion (US$867 million) from the government, company chief John Hsuan (宣明智) said yesterday.
TMC plans to ask the National Development Fund for about NT$30 billion in next two months, Hsuan told local cable channel USTV during a press conference in Hsinchu. The investment proposal will need approval from lawmakers, he said.
Hsuan, honorary vice chairman of United Microelectronics Corp (聯電), said the government hoped to spend as little as possible on restructuring the dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chip industry.
Some overseas private funds and a local memory module maker have already expressed interest in investing in TMC, Hsuan said, adding that the company would seek capital from local institutional investors, banks and component makers. He declined to name names, but said he would meet potential investors this week.
To defuse public concern over the creation of the company — and fears that it would be a waste of taxpayer’s money — Hsuan said he would limit the company’s cumulative losses to NT$15 billion.
He plans to visit Japan’s Elpida Memory Inc and Micron Technology Inc of the US in two weeks to discuss patents and intellectual property rights.
He said that TMC was not a short-term rescue program. Its goal was to help Taiwanese DRAM companies stay alive and turn a profit in three years by helping enhance their technological competitiveness, he said.
TMC was a revitalization plan for the DRAM industry, not a consolidation plan or a merger plan, which was what most investors and industry analysts had expected, Hsuan said.
Local DRAM companies had to solve their own financial problems, he said, not rely on TMC.
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