Joint memory manufacturing plant in China inaugurated
The inauguration ceremony was attended by high-level representatives from local and state authorities.
The new leading-edge facility, which will manufacture both NAND Flash and DRAM memories, is the result of the existing successful collaboration between Hynix and ST. Both partners will benefit from significant economies of scale, front-row access to the rapidly-growing Chinese market, and their complementary strengths in process and product development. T
he Wuxi fab will accelerate ST's involvement in the NAND Flash market, as well as provide competitive DRAM chips for use in system embedded solutions, stacked with Flash Memories. The new fab will expand Hynix's 300mm manufacturing capacity and strengthen its position in the world's fastest-growing Chinese semiconductor market.
Hynix currently holds the number one position of DRAM sales in China with a market share of approximately 47%, based on the most recent data from iSuppli. With the completion of the Wuxi fab, Hynix has another global manufacturing site in addition to its US fab in Eugene, Oregon.
The companies laid the first stone at the Wuxi site in April 2005. Set on a 550,000 square meter site area with a clean-room space of 20,000 square meters, volume production at the 200mm and 300mm manufacturing lines began in July 2006 and October 2006, respectively. Currently, production of DRAM is in 90nm and 110nm process technologies, at the 200mm line and 80nm in the 300mm line. By the middle of next year, the lines will start to produce NAND Flash in addition to the current production of DRAMs in state-of-the-art technology.
The 200mm line is today producing 50,000 wafers per month and the 300mm line is expected to generate at capacity 18,000 wafers per month. The split among products and memory densities will depend on market conditions.
The US$2 billion joint-venture fab is financed with equity from STMicroelectronics and Hynix on a 1/3 – 2/3 basis, respectively, and a financing package from Chinese local institutions and STMicroelectronics.
The joint-venture company employs about 2000 people, the majority of whom have been recruited from the local workforce. Located two hours from Shanghai, the Wuxi location offers access to a large and highly-skilled labor pool and a well-developed infrastructure with room for expansion.
"A joint venture of this magnitude is likely to be the largest of its kind between a Korean and European company," said Carlo Bozotti, President and CEO of STMicroelectronics. "It will bring both partners significant benefits of scale and complementarity. Guaranteed access to cost-competitive DRAM and jointly developed NAND products and technologies reinforces ST's leading position in package-level integration (PLI). By stacking multiple memory chips in a single package, this important technology of PLI allows our customers in China and worldwide to increase memory density and device reliability, while saving space in mobile handsets and other consumer and industrial applications."
"In 2005, the NAND Flash market grew faster than any segment in the history of the semiconductor market, driven by a spiraling demand for storage space in mobile phones, digital cameras, and portable audio players," said Mario Licciardello, STMicroelectronics' Corporate Vice President and General Manager of the Memory Product Group. "The ramp up of the 300mm production with 60nm SLC (Single-Level Cell) and MLC (Multi-Level Cell) NAND technology, rapidly moving to 55nm and below, will help ST match this growth and meet our customers' demand for high-performance and cost-competitive memory solutions in the mobile and digital consumer markets."
"Completion of the Wuxi fab would have not been accomplished without collaboration with ST and support from Wuxi. Through the joint-venture company, Hynix believes the cooperative relationship between ST, Wuxi, and Hynix will be further strengthened, and the new fab will be mutually beneficial for each company's long-term growth," said Eui-Jei Woo, Chairman and CEO of Hynix Semiconductor. "I expect Wuxi fab will be the solid footing for Hynix to be a global memory manufacturer."
"With the completion of the Wuxi fab, Hynix has established a global manufacturing network that connects Korea, the United States and China," said O. C. Kwon, senior VP of Strategic Planning of Hynix Semiconductor and Chairman of Hynix-ST Semiconductor. "The joint-venture company will be a firm base for Hynix's long-term competitiveness."
According to the market research company iSuppli, the DRAM market is expected to grow 24.4% this year, recording revenue of 30.9 billion dollars, and the NAND Flash market is expected to grow 17% in 2006, with revenue of 12.6 billion dollars.
China, the world's fastest growing semiconductor market, currently accounts for about 15% of the worldwide market. Forecasts project the China market to become the world's largest, representing more than one-fourth of the worldwide semiconductor market by 2008.
