A employee strikes a wafer financial institution at NXP semiconductors pc chip fabrication plant in Nijmegen, Netherlands March 14, 2024.
Piroschka Van De Wouw | Reuters
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.-backed Vanguard Worldwide Semiconductor Company and Dutch chip designer and producer NXP Semiconductors will construct a $7.8 billion wafer manufacturing plant in Singapore.
Vanguard could have 60% stake within the three way partnership — VisionPower Semiconductor Manufacturing Firm — whereas NXP will maintain 40%, in line with a joint assertion launched Wednesday.
The VSMC plant will produce wafers for the automotive, industrial, shopper and cellular machine markets, the businesses stated. TSMC will license the underlying manufacturing applied sciences required for the undertaking to VSMC.
The brand new plant, whose development is anticipated to begin within the second half of 2024, with wafers to be shipped to clients in 2027, is anticipated to create about 1,500 jobs in Singapore, the joint assertion stated.
Wafers are a skinny slice of semiconductor materials used to make microchips.
NXP will make investments $1.6 billion within the Singapore plant whereas Vanguard plans to speculate $2.4 billion, the assertion stated. The companies will even present a further $1.9 billion to assist the long-term capability of the plant, with the remaining funding supplied by third events.
“NXP continues to take proactive actions to make sure it has a producing base which supplies aggressive value, provide management and geographic resilience to assist our long-term progress targets,” stated Kurt Sievers, president and CEO at NXP.
Vanguard, which made a $236 million acquisition of a much less superior wafer facility in Singapore from New York-based contract chipmaker GlobalFoundries in 2019, stated the brand new plant will assist it diversify its manufacturing operations.
Singapore has attracted investments from a number of semiconductor firms, aided by its business-friendly surroundings.
GlobalFoundries opened a $4 billion chip fabrication plant in Singapore final yr, with its president lauding the federal government’s industrial insurance policies. In 2022 Taiwan’s United Microelectronics Corp invested $5 billion into its Singapore microchip manufacturing facility.
Neighbour Malaysia has additionally emerged as a hotspot for semiconductor firms, with investments from American chip giants Intel and GlobalFoundries. Different firms have additionally laid out plans to begin operations within the nation.
TSMC, the world’s largest semiconductor foundry, has been constructing new vegetation in nations like Japan and the U.S. as its clients search to de-risk from Taiwan amid intensifying U.S.-China tensions. Final yr, NXP invested in TSMC’s first chip plant in Dresden, Germany, TSMC’s first plant in Europe.
