| | | One clue of past tops was shorter lead times while double and triple booking to insure supplies pushed out lead times. Looks like lead times are still getting longer for many important items.
China foundries striving for more dummy wafer supplies
Josephine Lien, Taipei; Jessie Shen, DIGITIMES [Monday 26 June 2017]
China-based logic IC and memory foundries including Nexchip Semiconductor and Rui-Li (transliterated from Chinese) Integrated Circuit have offered 20% higher prices than what their bigger rivals offer in order to secure more supplies of "dummy" or test wafers particularly 12-inch ones, according to sources at upstream wafer suppliers.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), for example, is offering US$75-80 to purchase test wafers. China-based foundry players have proposed more than US$90 in order to grab more supplies, the sources said.
The higher prices China-based foundries are willing to offer for test wafers have prompted some upstream silicon wafer suppliers to stop quoting their prices for the fourth quarter of 2017 as they are inclined to closely observe market changes, the sources indicated.
Prices of prime silicon wafers, which rose for a third consecutive quarter in the three months to June, are expected to continue trending upward in the third and fourth quarters of 2017 due to tight supplies and growing demand, the sources noted.
Prices for polished wafers for use in the manufacture of DRAM, 3D NAND and other memory products are set to rise another 20% sequentially in the third quarter, while prices for epitaxial (epi) wafers for logic IC manufacturing will increase 15% on quarter. The anticipated less growth in epi-wafer prices is due to the long-term contracts major suppliers including Shin-Etsu and Sumco have stuck recently with their major customers, the sources said.
In other news...... more at digitimes.com
China foundries demanding more 12-inch test wafers
Photo: Digitimes file photo |
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