Apr 24, 2002 Shanghai, China
Silicon foundry startup Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC) of China here announced that it has signed a letter of intent with the IMEC research group in Belgium to co-develop advanced semiconductor process technologies.
Under the terms, SMIC will join IMEC's Industrial Affiliation Programs (IIAPs) for silicon process technologies. These joint R&D projects are geared for IMEC and a limited number of industrial partners. IIAP partners pay for access to IMEC's chip processing information.
"This agreement is a part of SMIC's initiative to enter the world-class community for research and development and to position the company for long-term technology leadership, " said Simon Yang, vice president of R&D at SMIC, based in Shanghai.
SMIC recently entered into production of eight-inch wafers, using a 0.25-micron process technology. The startup has said it expects to reach full capacity producing 85,000 eight-inch wafers per month by the end of 2004. In the initial production phase, the Shanghai foundry is expected to produce SRAMs, applications-specific memories, logic, and other ICs for digital TV, VCD/DVD players, mobile phone, and smart IC cards.
By year's end, the foundry startup will begin producing chips based on 0.18-micron process technologies. The company obtained its 0.18-micron process, as part of a deal with Singapore's Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing Pte. Ltd.
