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For Immediate Release
UMC Group Announces Equipment Installation at Newest 8-inch Fab
First equipment for 40k per month capacity Fab 8F moves in ahead of schedule,
in spite of recent earthquake in Taiwan
HSINCHU, Taiwan, October 13, 1999 - UMC Group
announced the move-in of the first pieces of production equipment
at its new 8" fab, Fab 8F (formerly called UMC Fab 5). This is an
important milestone that marks the completion of cleanroom construction
at the fab located in the Hsinchu Science-based Industrial Park.
The equipment move-in is progressing ahead of schedule in anticipation
of trial production in December. Fab 8F is the first of two new
UMC Group fabs that will deliver volume production in the year 2000,
making UMC Group the largest foundry supplier of 0.25-micron and
0.18-micron technology as it is shipping 1.2 million wafers with
geometries of 0.25 micron and below. The second fab, Fab 8C (formerly
called USC 2), will begin trial production at the end of Q1 2000.
With the introduction of these two fabs, UMC Group will operate
a total of seven modern 8" wafer fabs.
Chris Chi, senior vice president in charge of operations at Fab
8F, said, "We are moving equipment into Fab 8F two weeks ahead of
our already accelerated schedule. This is a remarkable accomplishment
considering the scale of the recent earthquake in Taiwan. The fact
that none of the UMC Group fabs suffered any significant structural
damage is a testimony to the quality of fab construction techniques
in Taiwan. With this new fab, UMC Group will be better positioned
to respond to the strong demand we are currently experiencing for
our advanced process technologies."
Fab 8F is the newest of UMC Group's fleet of ultra-modern manufacturing
facilities with total investment expected to reach US$1.5 billion.
The fab has a design capacity of 40,000 wafers per month, and will
exceed 20K monthly production by the end of 2000. Fab 8F will ramp
production with UMC Group's state-of-the-art 0.18-micron logic process,
and eventually support 0.15 and 0.13-micron process technology.
Jim Kupec, president of UMC Group (USA) said, "At UMC Group, we
are committed to leading the foundry industry in capacity for leading-edge
process technologies. Fab investment and technology development
are the cornerstones of this strategy. Although UMC Group currently
operates the largest fleet of leading-edge fabs in the semiconductor
industry, we must continually invest in new facilities to enable
the rapid growth of our customers. In particular, we are experiencing
a strong demand for our 0.25-micron and 0.18-micron technologies.
The introduction of volume production for these technologies at
two new leading-edge fabs in 2000 is tremendous news for our foundry
customers."
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