STATS ChipPAC on January 5 hold a groundbreaking ceremony for its new factory in Singapore, according to the chip test and packaging service provider. The new 197,000-square foot building will be located next to the company's existing factory in Yishun, targeting wafer-level technologies including embedded wafer-level ball grid array (eWLB), wafer-level chip scale packaging (WLCSP), integrated passive devices (IPD) and through silicon via (TSV).
STATS ChipPAC expects to start operating the new factory by the fourth quarter of 2012. STATS ChipPAC's combined manufacturing space in Singapore will expand to 792,000 square feet from the current 595,000 square feet, once the new site is completed.
The new facility will allow STATS ChipPAC to further expand its capacity in advanced packaging and testing solutions to support growing customer demand, the company said. Wafer-level packaging has been one of the highest growth segments in the semiconductor industry with demand that has outpaced the available market capacity, it added.
In addition, STATS ChipPAC revealed it had invested approximately US$250 million to expand its technology offerings and manufacturing capacity in Singapore over the last three years. Another US$220 million will be poured into the Singapore operations over the next several years, the company indicated.
"Advanced wafer-level technologies are essential to support our customers' requirements fore increased performance and functionality in a smaller footprint for sophisticated mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets," Tan Lay Koon, president and CEO of STATS ChipPAC, said in a statement. "Expanding our global manufacturing footprint in advanced wafer-level packaging will further strengthen our leadership in these technologies and reinforce Singapore's position as a leading location for advanced packaging technology."
"In 2010, we celebrated the grand opening of our new 300mm eWLB manufacturing in Singapore. Today's groundbreaking is another major milestone for STATS ChipPAC Singapore," Lew Hon Sang, managing director for STATS ChipPAC Singapore, said in the same statement.
Source:digitimes