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Politics : Formerly About Applied Materials -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: 16yearcycle who wrote (32868)	10/19/1999 9:34:00 AM
From: Proud_Infidel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 70976

TSMC to spend $2 billion for 50% more capacity in 2000 By J. Robert Lineback Semiconductor Business News (10/19/99, 08:55:04 AM EDT) SAN JOSE -- With silicon foundry services now running at full strength one month after Taiwan's powerful earthquake, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. is resuming efforts to increase wafer processing by more than 50% over last year's levels, said Magnus Ryde, president of the TSMC North American subsidiary here. The target for the year 2000 is to again increase TSMC's total wafer processing capacity by more than 50% over this year's levels, Ryde added in an interview with SBN. To quickly build up TSMC's production volume, the world's largest pure-play silicon foundry has now set capital spending at more than $2 billion for next year following this year's record $1.3 billion, he said. TSMC and its foundry rivals are racing each other to sharply ramp up wafer-processing volumes as the semiconductor industry continues a strong second-half recovery this year. Many analysts believe TSMC, UMC Group and other major foundries had completely sold out their 1999 capacity by June. Now it has become a scramble to bring up additional capacity. "The growth will be limited by our ability to supply volumes," Ryde noted. "Every time TSMC meetings with its major foundry customers, capacity forecasts are greatly increased, he said. Some unit forecasts have been increased by as much as 20% for the fourth quarter over August projections, Ryde added. As far as TSMC is concerned, the impact of Taiwan's Sept 21 earthquake is past with production lines in Hsinchu closed for a little more than a week while full power was being restored and equipment re-qualified. Ryde said frontend production yields are now back at pre-quake levels -- "even better," he quipped. Now, the silicon foundry giant is refocusing all of its attention on aggressively building up new capacity to keep up with the boom, which is being driven by a range of end-equipment applications, including low-cost PCs, cellular phones and infrastructure for telecommunications and the Internet, Ryde said. This year, TSMC expects to see revenues grow more than 33% to $2 billion over last year's $1.5 billion, he stated. Last year, TSMC's wafer output was a little more than 1.2 million 8-inch wafers, Ryde estimated. This year, TSMC expects to fabricate nearly 1.8 million wafers. "That's counting the disruption from the earthquake," he added. In 2000, the target is 2.7 million 8-inch wafers, he added. In addition to fabs in Hsinchu, TSMC plans to add capacity at its joint venture, Wafer Tech, in Camus, Wash., where the ramp of the 8-inch fab was hampered this year by delays in equipment deliveries, according to Ryde. A new 8-inch fab in Southern Taiwan's Tainan business park is slated to begin shipping wafers in February. TSMC's joint venture with Philips Semiconductor in Singapore is also expected to ship a "few symbolic wafers before the end of next year," Ryde said. TSMC also is pushing a head with its 300-mm wafer production plans following last summer's announced joint-venture with memory maker Vanguard International Semiconductor Corp. in Hsinchu. The pilot line is slated to begin ordering 300-mm equipment in 2001 and its first wafer runs will start in 2002. On the heels of that project, TSMC is planning to set up a high-volume 300-mm fab in Tainan, which will go on line in the second half of 2002, Ryde said. While TSMC is on a sharp build-up of new wafer processing capacity, it does not currently plan to add a new geographic location to its worldwide manufacturing network. There are no plans to set up a foundry site in Europe, Ryde said. "We have a lot of expansion room in existing locations," he added. For example, Wafer Tech has room for three more wafer fabs and multiple plants are likely in Tainan as well as additional lines in Hsinchu, Ryde said. semibiznews.com