Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電) yesterday said that it plans to build a 12-inch fab in Miaoli County next year as strong demand for display drivers used in laptops and image sensors has boosted factory utilization to 100 percent.
The new facility is part of the contract chipmaker’s NT$278 billion (US$9.42 billion) plan, announced about two years ago, to build two 12-inch fabs in the county’s Tongluo Industrial Park (銅鑼科學園區) with a combined capacity of 100,000 wafers a month.
Powerchip makes CMOS image sensors, DRAM chips and driver ICs used in flat panels for mobile phones, and operates three 12-inch fabs and two 8-inch fabs in Taiwan, as well as a 12-inch fab in China.
“The company hopes to start building the new Tongluo fab in the second quarter next year,” spokesman Eric Tang (譚仲民) told the Taipei Times by telephone. “Customers are showing strong demand for driver ICs, CMOS sensors and power management chips. Supply constraints are to extend into the fourth quarter of this year.”
Powerchip attributed the strong demand to resilient laptop sales, chairman Frank Huang (黃崇仁) told reporters on the sidelines of a briefing in Taipei, adding that capacity expansion among Powerchip’s peers is very limited.
Some customers already want to book capacity at the yet-to-be-built fab, which would have an initial capacity of 15,000 wafers per month, Huang said.
Utilization at Nextchip Co Ltd (晶合集成), a joint venture with the Hefei City Government, has also reached almost 100 percent, he said.
Nextchip, which is 41.28 percent owned by Powerchip, is likely to hold an initial public offering on the Shanghai Stock Exchange by the end of this year, he added.
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