SMIC establishes first 12-inch chip production line in mainland
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Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp, or SMIC, has established a 12-inch chip production line in Beijing, the first of its kind on the Chinese mainland.
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South Korea's Samsung Electronics Co., the world's largest memory chipmaker, said it would invest some 24 billion dollars in building new chip production lines over the next six years.
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Samsung Electronics has developed a chip-manufacturing technique able to significantly increase the amount of music, pictures, videos, and other data people can store in future iPods, iPhones, and other devices.The world&#39;s largest memory chip maker showed off a 64Gb multilevel cell (MLC) NAND flash memory chip made with an entirely new 30-nanometer production technology. A nanometer is a billionth of a meter, and the measure refers to the average size of the smallest features on the chip. The manufacturing breakthrough, which Samsung calls self-aligned double patterning technology (SaDPT), will enable the company to greatly increase the storage capacity of new NAND flash memory chips once the technology is in commercial production.For example, 16 of the 64Gb chips can be combined in a memory card for 128GB of storage space, enough for 80 DVD movies or 32,000 MP3 music files, the company said in a statement.Even more important for users, Samsung was able to make the technology leap without requiring certain expensive new chip making equipment. While moves to smaller production technologies often require investment in expensive new photolithography equipment, the company was able to use current photolithography gear to etch circuits on the silicon wafers. That should ensure low production costs and reasonable prices for end-users.SaDPT technology uses two pattern transfers to create the circuit design of each chip. The first transfer spaces the circuits widely apart, then the second transfer uses that space between the circuits to add another circuit, with the result that the circuitry is more densely packed together.Samsung has applied for 30 patents related to the new 64Gb flash chip, and said it also created a 32Gb chip with the same production technology. The company expects to begin mass production of 64Gb flash chips with its 30nm manufacturing technology in 2009.
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Semiconductor chips that can manage a good bit of their own upkeep are moving closer to reality.
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Company alters traditional chip configuration to pack more memory into an even smaller unit.
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US memory chip maker Micron Technology Inc. plans to build its first factory in China, to assemble and test semiconductors, the company said Monday.
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Chip maker plans for smaller, faster, less power-hungry processors.
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InfoWorld - Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC), China's largest chip maker, has signed a deal to license a 45-nanometer (nm) manufacturing process from IBM, the company said Wednesday.
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Upcoming chips will lead to relatively inexpensive hardware, company says.
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(InfoWorld) - The head of the world's largest contract chip maker said his industry will have trouble maintaining sales and profit growth in the future because the overall chip industry has slowed down and there's a lot more competition. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) plans to expand to new markets and find new work in product areas such as chips for mobile phones, digital cameras, and other consumer electronics devices in order to meet these challenges, said Morris Chang, the chairman of TSMC, at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference in San Francisco on Monday. The company released information from his speech. Overall revenue growth in the chip industry has slowed to around 6 percent per year between 2000 and 2010, from 16 percent each year prior to 2000, he said. At the same time, more new rivals have entered the contract chip making business. His company will have to find new ways to grow despite these challenges, he said. "Growth opportunities exist in cell-phone applications, game systems, digital TV, LCD displays, power management, MP3 devices, and digital cameras," a paper Chang submitted to the conference reads. Developing closer relationships with the chip design companies that create chips for these kinds of products will be a key strategy for TSMC in the future. TSMC manufactures chips that are designed by other companies, a business model it pioneered. Prior to the Taiwanese company's founding, small chip design firms had to ask Intel, Motorola, and other big chip makers to make their chips, and these companies would only comply if their factories weren't being fully used already. Most small companies didn't have enough money to set up their own chip factory because the high tech plants used to cost around $1 billion each. Now, a new one can cost $3.5 billion. TSMC stepped in to fill the gap, and the result has been the steady growth of chip design companies that never build their own factories. They rely on TSMC or other foundry chip makers, including Taiwan's United Microelectronics Corp. (UMC), to manufacture their chips. Mobile phone chip developer Qualcomm and graphics chip designer Nvidia are two examples of companies that have been wildly successful, despite not owning their own factories. They farm out production to foundries such as TSMC and UMC. The success of TSMC and UMC has caused a number of new competitors to enter the chip foundry business. IBM, Samsung Semiconductor, and China's Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC)Â are all examples of latecomers to the foundry business. These new rivals have been able to survive, and in some cases thrive. "The growth of the industry has attracted many companies to offer foundry services. Consequently, competition between these companies increases the potential for commoditization of foundry services," according to Chang's report. He goes on to say that going forward, the best defense for TSMC will be to engage with chip design customers far earlier in the developing stage of their products, and to offer a wider range of production services. TSMC and UMC hold around a 75 percent share of the global chip foundry business, according to investment banking firm Merrill Lynch & Co. Last week, TSMC said itÂ opened its first office Bangalore, India, to find new customers and help existing ones complete their chip designs faster and bring products more quickly to market. Â
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IBM , Singapore's Chartered  Semiconductor  and Samsung Electronics   will join forces to develop and manufacture chips using an  advanced processing technology, the companies said on  Wednesday.
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Advanced Micro Devices says it has reached a chip manufacturing milestone that will lead to improvements across its range of processor offerings for PCs and servers.
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(InfoWorld) - In a sign ofÂ China's growing importanceÂ as a center of semiconductor manufacturing, Chinese chip makers will spend more than ever before on cutting-edge factories over the next two years. Chinese spending on chip plants will top $9.8 billion between 2006 and 2008, with most of these funds going towards the construction of factories that produce chips on 300-millimeter wafers, industry group SEMI said. If realized, this spending forecast will top combined Chinese spending on chip plants over the last five years, which amounted to $8.7 billion, it said. Around 70 percent of the money that will be spent on new Chinese plants will go towards factories that use 300-millimeter wafers, which will result in an annual increase in production capacity of 16 percent by 2008, SEMI said. At least five new 300-millimeter plants are expected to come online by 2008, it said. While the fast growth of China's market presents opportunities for established chip makers as well as new entrants, established players -- especially those with Chinese government backing and overseas funding -- will fare better over the long term, SEMI said. Leading China's charge forward in chip production is Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., the country's largest chip maker. Among a string of production plants across China, SMIC has one 300-millimeter plant in production and another two under construction in Beijing. The company has also signed an agreement to manage the operations of other plants, including a 300-millimeter fab to be constructed in Wuhan. That agreement helpedÂ spark a lawsuitÂ by rival Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp., which said the deal violated the terms of a 2005 settlement agreement that ended a patent infringement lawsuit brought against SMIC by TSMC. The latest lawsuit is currently pending in a California state court.
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(InfoWorld) - Via Technologies plans to develop PC motherboards that are even smaller than theÂ business card-sized Mobile ITX productÂ it announced on Tuesday. "In another year or two we will come out with even smaller form factors," Wenchi Chen, Via's CEO, promised at the Via Technology Forum, which is being held alongside the Computex exhibition in Taipei. Chen used his keynote to unveil the Mobile ITX board developed by Via. Measuring 7.5 centimeters by 4.5 cm, the tiny motherboard pushes the limits of what's possible using currently available components. Over time, the integration of components, such as combining the CPU and chip set inside a single package to conserve space, will allow Via to shrink motherboard sizes further. "The single CPU chip will happen," Chen said. Via is a distant third in the microprocessor market, trailing far behind Intel and Advanced Micro Devices. But the company has found a small and growing niche in the market for low-power processor designed for small computers. Four or five years ago, that primarily meant small desktop computers based on Via's Mini-ITX motherboards, which measure 17 cm by 17 cm. But now hardware makers are putting Via's chips into small mobile devices. Samsung ElectronicsÂ last year became the first top-tier vendor to embrace Via's mobile chips, putting them inside its Q1 ultramobile PC. Since then, Hewlett-Packard has used Via's chips in a low-power desktop PC for China, and a string of vendors have announced portable computers based on them. One of those companies is OQO, which uses a Via processor in its OQO model 02 ultramobile computer, which it bills as the smallest Windows Vista computer on the market. Other ultramobile devices that use Via's processors include theÂ NanoBook reference designÂ announced Tuesday, and Giga-byte Technology's U60, which was sold in Taiwan through a partnership with Chunghwa Telecom, which bundled the device with its 3.5G mobile service. "It sold out in the first 20 minutes, faster than anything they'd experienced," Chen said. And more is to come. Over the next six months, Via will announce deals with more vendors for ultraportable devices based on its chips, Chen said. Â
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(InfoWorld) - South Korean memory chip giant Hynix SemiconductorÂ on Wednesday denied local media reports that it planned to move its operations to China. A problem finding land in South Korea for a new factory to make chips on 12-inch (300 millimeter) wafers apparently turned into speculation that the company, frustrated, would simply move to China, where it already operates a joint venture chip factory. A South Korean newspaper cited local politicians saying Hynix would make the move. But the DRAM (dynamic RAM) maker says it's not going anywhere, and the rumor had been blown so far out of proportion that it put out a statement to clarify the issue. "There were some local news reports that we're planning to move our operation to China. ... Hynix is not reviewing that option," said Kim Mi-Young, a Hynix representative. The company started looking for a new site for the planned factory after South Korea's environmental protection agency turned down a request to build it near its Ichon complex in Kyonggi Province, for fear it might contaminate a nearby river. Hynix considered another location, Chongju, where it already owns a piece of land, but ran into further trouble. Its land there is too small for the planned facility, and the constant press coverage over the environmental issue caused landowners in Chongju to speculate Hynix might come calling, and raise their prices accordingly. Now, the company says Chongju is too expensive. It still does not know where it might build the new factory.
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SAN JOSE, Calif. Semiconductor company Intel says it has made a breakthrough development in shrinking the size of chips. The Santa Clara-based company announced today it has created a fully functional 70 megabit
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(InfoWorld) - Taiwan's largest DRAM maker, Powerchip Semiconductor, on Monday denied a local media report that it planned to build a chip factory in China with a Japanese partner. The Chinese-language Commercial Times newspaper said Powerchip had invited Japan's Renesas Technology to jointly invest in a chip factory in China. Renesas and Powerchip currently work together in technology and chip production outsourcing pacts. Powerchip said it isn't making any China plans right now because it's too busy. "This is just a rumor, nothing has been done yet," said Eric Tang, a vice president at Powerchip. Powerchip has alreadyÂ gained approval from the Taiwan governmentÂ to invest in China, but one of the rules requires it to move used equipment from an old factory in Taiwan to its new China plant, instead of buying new machinery. The trouble is that orders at Powerchip are too brisk to consider such a move, Tang said. The company's older chip plant, called an 8-inch plant due to the size of the silicon wafers used to make chips on, is still making money in Taiwan so there's no need to move it to China right now, he said. Powerchip may buy used equipment from elsewhere and move it to China instead of using gear from its own 8-inch plant, he said. The company has no plans to move forward on the project in the near term. Taiwan and China remain enemies after splitting in 1949 amid civil war, the reason Taipei carefully regulates high tech investments to the mainland. Despite their strained relationship, China remains the favored destination for Taiwanese investment due to their shared language and culture, as well as China's lower costs and incentives for building factories.