United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電), the world’s No. 2 contract chipmaker, yesterday inked contracts with Japan’s top memory company, Elpida Memory Inc, and local chip packager, Powertech Technology Inc (力成), to accelerate development of a cutting-edge technology to make new integrated chips.
To meet the growing demand for high-performance and low-power consumption chips for smartphones and other handheld devices, the companies aime to ramp up production of chips using the new technology called through-silicon via (TSV) in 2012.
The companies did not disclose how much they plan to invest in the program.
They said the technology would be one of several possible solutions for chipmakers to make cost-effective chips as it becomes difficult to save on costs by shrinking chip circuit further.
Many of Elpida’s customers have encountered difficulties in integrating CPU and memory chips and “most of our customers want us to provide one-stop shopping,” Elpida chief executive Yukio Sakamoto told a press briefing in Hsinchu.
Customers — mostly from the US — in the smartphone, PC graphics and digital camera segments have asked for more integrated chips supply.
UMC plans to produce the first prototype of the integrated chips, or 3D ICs, in the middle of next year using 28-nanometer technology, the most advanced technology available to the chipmaker.
UMC chief executive Sun Shih-wei (孫世偉) said TSV is a revolutionary technology and would “become another viable option” amid increasing technological and cost challenges of CMOS scaling technology for constructing integrated circuits.
UMC said the three-way cooperation would help it enhance cost competitiveness and speed up 3D chip’s time to market.
Powertech chairman Tsai Tu-king (蔡篤恭) said it “is too early to predict revenue contribution from the TSV technology.”
However, any company that succeeds in developing TSV technology would be able to gain a competitive position in the market over the next three to five years when the technology matures and becomes cost-effective.
Local memory chipmaker Macronix International Co Ltd (旺宏) is also set to unveil its latest development of 3D IC technology and its roadmap on Thursday.
Share prices of UMC rose 0.67 percent to NT$15.05, underperforming the benchmark TAIEX, which gained 1.9 percent yesterday, while local rival Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) rose 0.96 percent to NT$63.30.
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