US-based memorychip supplier Micron Technology Inc on Friday said that it would start producing its most advanced DRAM exclusively in Taiwan in 2025.
Micron said that it would mass produce chips using its advanced 1-gamma process node DRAM in Taiwan, ahead of any other production site worldwide.
The company installed cutting-edge extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography production equipment in its A3 fab in Taichung last year.
Photo: Reuters
The 1-gamma process — its third-generation 10 nanometer-class node — was jointly developed by Micron’s research and development (R&D) teams in Taiwan and Japan.
Micron on Thursday said it would invest up to US$3.6 billion in Japan.
A Ministry of Economic Affairs official said that Micron had informed the ministry of its investment plan in Japan before it was announced.
Micron’s R&D program in Taiwan remains unchanged and would continue as planned, the official said.
The statements from Micron and the ministry apparently aim to ease concerns over the company’s future in Taiwan.
Micron announced its Japanese investment plan after Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida met with executives from seven semiconductor companies, including Micron and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電). The others were Applied Materials Inc, IBM Corp, Samsung Electronics Co, Intel Corp and Belgian semiconductor research group Interuniversity Microelectronics Centre.
The plan would include additional investment over the next few years in Micron’s factory in Hiroshima Prefecture, the company said.
According to a report from Nikkei Asia, the Hiroshima plant produces advanced DRAM chips and the US chipmaker plans to install a state-of-the-art production line there, with Tokyo’s backing.
That could include EUV lithography production equipment, needed for the mass production of the 1-gamma process, which Micron said it would install in Japan, without specifying whether it would be used at the Hiroshima facility.
EUV refers to a soft X-ray technology, which has a wavelength of 13.5 nanometers.
Micron is the largest foreign employer and foreign direct investor in Taiwan, with more than 10,000 workers in its fabs in Taichung and Taoyuan.
Micron has said it would continue to recruit highly skilled personnel in the years ahead.
The Taoyuan factory is from Micron’s acquisition of Taiwanese DRAM maker Inotera Memories Inc (華亞科技) in 2016, while the Taichung factory is from the acquisition of another local DRAM maker, Rexchip Electronics Corp (瑞晶電子), in 2012.
SEMICONDUCTOR SERVICES: A company executive said that Taiwanese firms must think about how to participate in global supply chains and lift their competitiveness Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said it expects to launch its first multifunctional service center in Pingtung County in the middle of 2027, in a bid to foster a resilient high-tech facility construction ecosystem. TSMC broached the idea of creating a center two or three years ago when it started building new manufacturing capacity in the US and Japan, the company said. The center, dubbed an “ecosystem park,” would assist local manufacturing facility construction partners to upgrade their capabilities and secure more deals from other global chipmakers such as Intel Corp, Micron Technology Inc and Infineon Technologies AG, TSMC said. It
People walk past advertising for a Syensqo chip at the Semicon Taiwan exhibition in Taipei yesterday.
NO BREAKTHROUGH? More substantial ‘deliverables,’ such as tariff reductions, would likely be saved for a meeting between Trump and Xi later this year, a trade expert said China launched two probes targeting the US semiconductor sector on Saturday ahead of talks between the two nations in Spain this week on trade, national security and the ownership of social media platform TikTok. China’s Ministry of Commerce announced an anti-dumping investigation into certain analog integrated circuits (ICs) imported from the US. The investigation is to target some commodity interface ICs and gate driver ICs, which are commonly made by US companies such as Texas Instruments Inc and ON Semiconductor Corp. The ministry also announced an anti-discrimination probe into US measures against China’s chip sector. US measures such as export curbs and tariffs
The US on Friday penalized two Chinese firms that acquired US chipmaking equipment for China’s top chipmaker, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯國際), including them among 32 entities that were added to the US Department of Commerce’s restricted trade list, a US government posting showed. Twenty-three of the 32 are in China. GMC Semiconductor Technology (Wuxi) Co (吉姆西半導體科技) and Jicun Semiconductor Technology (Shanghai) Co (吉存半導體科技) were placed on the list, formally known as the Entity List, for acquiring equipment for SMIC Northern Integrated Circuit Manufacturing (Beijing) Corp (中芯北方積體電路) and Semiconductor Manufacturing International (Beijing) Corp (中芯北京), the US Federal Register posting said. The
RSS