Hsinchu, Taiwan, and Osaka, Japan, September 17, 2003 - UMC (NYSE: UMC), a world leading semiconductor foundry and Ricoh Company Ltd., today announced that the two companies have expanded upon their 0.13um partnership success with the introduction of several new image-processing ICs based on this leading edge process technology, with working silicon already achieved for one of the new products. UMC has been in volume production for Ricoh's 0.13um GPU chip with excellent manufacturing yields, and is applying this knowledge and experience to rapidly develop Ricoh's new line of 0.13um products.
Mr. Kenji Wakabayashi, director of Imagining System LSI Development Center at Ricoh Company Ltd, commented, "We are impressed with UMC's outstanding 0.13um support and proven world class manufacturing. The low defect densities achieved during volume production for Ricoh's existing 0.13um products at UMC has allowed us to realize the increased performance and cost benefits of this technology. We look forward to leveraging this 0.13um success for Ricoh's upcoming products to reinforce the company's status as a leading advanced LSI IC provider for Japan's competitive image processing segment."
"This important milestone underscores the close partnership between Ricoh and UMC and our ability to deliver the many advantages of 0.13um technology to them,"said H.J. Wu, president of UMC in charge of the Japan Business Group and also president of UMCJ. "The smaller die sizes associated with 0.13um designs combined with volume production and high yields translate into greatly increased productivity. These are benefits that Ricoh can directly pass on to their customers."
UMC is currently in 0.13um volume production for numerous customers with ICs that serve a wide range of applications from markets that include consumer, computer and networking products. Sales from products manufactured on 0.13um represented 6 percent of UMC's revenue in Q2 2003.
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