Taipei, Taiwan, R.O.C. - March 17, 2005 - United Microelectronics Corporation (TAIEX: 2303, NYSE: UMC), today held a meeting of the Board of Directors and Supervisors, at which the Board submitted proposals to be resolved at the Annual General Meeting, approved the 2004 Business Report and Financial Statements, and set the date for the Annual General Meeting. A brief summary of the proposals is as follows:

• Stock dividend payment of NT$1 per common share
• Issuance of employee bonus of 197,285,530 common shares
• Approval of the Company's "Code of Ethics for Directors, Supervisors and Officers"
• Approval of the Company's "Audit Committee Charter"
• Amendment of the dividend policy in the Company's Articles of Incorporation: dividend to be allocated as cash dividend in the range of 20% to 100% and stock dividend in the range of 0% to 80%.
• Amendment of the employee bonus policy in the Company's Articles of Incorporation: bonus to employees in the form of new shares or cash.
  
  

UMC's Board of Directors will propose to issue a stock dividend of 100 common shares for every 1000 common shares at the Annual General Meeting. UMC's Board of Directors has carefully considered the need to attract talented employees as well as the needs of the Company's shareholders. Thus it also proposes to distribute 197,285,530 new shares as employee bonuses, as part of its competitive compensation program for attracting and retaining the world's best talent. The estimated stock dilution effect of the employee bonus issuance is about 1%.

As part of UMC's ongoing effort to enhance corporate governance, UMC's Board of Directors approved the Company's "Audit Committee Charter" and will set up an audit committee. The company also approved the "Code of Ethics for Directors, Supervisors and Officers". It is a further step in UMC's endeavor to meet or surpass the highest benchmarks for corporate governance.

UMC's Board of Directors approved the 2004 Business Report and Financial Statements. The Company's revenue for 2004 was NT$117,311,840 thousand and net income after tax was NT$31,843,381 thousand, with EPS of NT$1.89.

The 2005 Annual General Meeting will be held at 9:00 AM, on Monday, June 13, 2005.

UMC (NYSE: UMC, TSE: 2303) is a leading global semiconductor foundry that manufactures advanced process ICs for applications spanning every major sector of the semiconductor industry. UMC delivers cutting-edge foundry technologies that enable sophisticated system-on-chip (SOC) designs, including 90nm copper, 0.13um copper, and mixed signal/RFCMOS. UMC is also a leader in 300mm manufacturing; Fab 12A in Taiwan and Singapore-based UMCi are both in volume production for a variety of customer products. UMC employs over 10,500 people worldwide and has offices in Taiwan, Japan, Singapore, Europe, and the United States. UMC can be found on the web at http://www.umc.com.