News-in-brief: March 2022

Technology Lam Researchannounced a new selection of etch products for the development of gate-all-around transistors. The three products – Argos, Prevos and Selis – are designed to support manufacturing of 3D transistor structures without damaging the critical material layers, through decontaminating wafer surfaces and enabling ultra-high selectivity etching.

Agilent Technologiesannounced its acquisition of advanced artificial intelligence (AI) technology called ACIES, which was developed by Virtual Control. The software is expected to improve the efficiency and accuracy of its gas chromatography (GC) and mass spectrometry (MS) platforms by automating the labor-intensive task of GC/MS data analysis.

Policy and Regulation The European Commission formally proposed the EU’s Chips Act, which aims to mobilize more than €43 billion of public and private investments to increase the EU’s global semiconductor market share to 20% by 2030. The EU or its Member States will fund €11 billion, and other support will include financing equity for start-ups and scale-ups. The proposed initiatives also target increased funding for R&D and improving supply chain resiliency.

Projects TSMC announced that an additional $1.6 billion investment will be allocated for the fab planned in a JV with Sony Semiconductor Solutions at Kumamoto, Japan. The project price tag is now $8.6 billion due to TSMC’s decision to enhance the capabilities of the fab’s process technology, with 12/16nm FinFET to be used in addition to the 22/28nm processes originally announced in 2021. Influential in this decision was the $350 million investment of DENSO Corporation, which will take a minority stake in the fab.

German chipmaker Infineon will invest more than $2 billion to expand its fab in Kulim, Malaysia. Construction is set to begin in June 2022 with equipment installation starting in summer 2024. This month, Infineon also said it would invest $700 million to expand its semiconductor fab in Texas at its Southeast Austin campus but is awaiting a response from city officials concerning its application for financial incentives.

Linde won a build-own-operate contract to supply high-purity industrial gases for a new fab owned by an unnamed leading semiconductor manufacturer in Singapore. The ultra-high-purity nitrogen and oxygen generator is expected to be operational in H2 2022. Linde did not disclose the contract’s value, but said it is one of more than $1 billion worth of new electronics industry projects the company has signed in the past year.

Exyte, in a joint partnership with Gilbane Building Company, was awarded a contract to build a $279 million advanced compound semiconductor lab at Hansom Air Force Base in Massachusetts for the Department of Defense. Construction completion is slated for 2025.

Investment and Market trends According to the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), global semiconductor sales totaled $555.9 billion in 2021, representing the highest-ever annual total and a year-over-year increase of 26.2%. The industry shipped a record 1.15 trillion semiconductor units in 2021 to meet booming global demand for microchips. The North American market saw the biggest sales jump (27.4%), while Japan was the only country to contract (-0.03%).

Company News Intelwill acquire analog chip manufacturer Tower Semiconductor for $5.4 billion. Tower’s technology portfolio includes radio frequency, silicon-germanium and industrial sensors, as well as electronic design automation intellectual property. The deal will see Intel gain mature 150mm and 200mm wafer-producing fabs.

Intelannounced a $1 billion fund to support early-stage start-ups and established company scale-ups to build a foundry ecosystem. The fund will prioritize projects accelerating time to market, and will include software tools, chip designs and advanced packaging technologies.

Kioxia reported on 9th February that contaminated chemical materials used for manufacturing processes has affected the production of 3D NAND and 2D flash memory products at two Japanese fabs. As of 3rd March, production resumed as normal. Kioxia joint venture (JV) partner Western Digital announced that the incident will reduce availability of these products by “at least 6.5 exabytes”, or 27% of its quarterly shipment.

Vedanta and Foxconn formed a JV to manufacture semiconductors in India, with Vedanta being the majority shareholder. This is the first major plan for domestic semiconductor manufacturing since the Indian government announced a $10 billion incentive scheme. Vedanta has earmarked $15 billion for chip and display manufacturing, with potential plans to scale up investment to as much as $20 billion.