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Trecenti Technologies
Produces World's First 300mm Foundry Wafers
4Mb and
8Mb SRAM test wafers are also the world's first wafer-outs
from a production 300mm facility
Hitachinaka City, Japan, December 4, 2000 –
Trecenti Technologies, Inc. (Trecenti), the joint venture
foundry established by IC technology leaders Hitachi, Ltd.
(NYSE : HIT) and United Microelectronics Corporation (NYSE:
UMC), set two major industry milestones with the successful
production of its first ICs using 300-mm (12-inch) wafers.
In addition to being the world's first 300-mm foundry wafers,
they are also the world's first wafers fabricated in a 300-mm
production facility. The functional 4M and 8M SRAM chips were
produced on December 1,2000 using 0.18-um technology and demonstrated
reasonable first-silicon yields. This milestone was achieved
two months ahead of the original schedule.
"We have worked very hard to accomplish this milestone,
and are extremely pleased to see the results of our efforts
less than one year after Trecenti's establishment. This achievement
clearly demonstrates the strength of our world class engineering
team, as well as the commitment from Hitachi and UMC to make
this joint venture successful, " said Toshio Nohara, president
of Trecenti. "With the successful completion of this pilot
run, we are positioned to offer volume production capacity
well ahead of the original scheduled roadmap."
Trecenti was established on March 15 this year.
The company was established as a dedicated wafer foundry with
Hitachi owning a 60% equity stake and UMC holding 40%. The
capacity will be shared equally between both companies.
"
We are glad to see that our many years of research and development
to prepare for the transition to 300-mm wafers and single
wafer processing are paying off with the success of Trecenti's
pilot run. We are confident that Trecenti will set a new standard
for competitiveness in the semiconductor industry by leveraging
the benefits of 300-mm technology with the fast-cycle times
and high yields associated with pure-play foundries like UMC,
"said Tadashi Ishibashi, president and CEO of Semiconductors
and Integrated Circuits for Hitachi.
300-mm wafers have over twice the usable area
of industry-standard 200mm (8-inch) wafers, yielding roughly
2.5 times the die, significantly reducing manufacturing costs
per chip. When the process becomes mature, 300mm manufacturing
is expected to lower production costs by up to 30%.
"The strong combination of technology and manufacturing
expertise from the Hitachi and UMC joint venture has helped
us to establish a leadership position in the introduction
of production for 300-mm wafers," said John Hsuan, chairman
of UMC. "Being first in the industry to produce these larger
diameter wafers in a production 300-mm facility will allow
us to quickly bring the cost and efficiency benefits of this
technology to our foundry customers from Japan and abroad."
Volume production at Trecenti is expected to begin
in March 2001.
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