Taiwan PCB makers to embrace bright prospects for 2021
Taiwan-based PCB makers are expected to see their combined output value grow further in 2021, driven by strong demand for IC substrates, HDI boards and flexible PCBs, according to market sources.
Phison puts increased focus on non-CE apps
Phison Electronics, which specializes in flash storage devices and controller ICs, has put increased focus on enterprise, automotive and industrial applications while lowering sales generated from the consumer electronics sector as a proportion of company revenue to 30%.
Kioxia breaks ground for new 3D NAND wafer fab
Kioxia held a groundbreaking ceremony for a semiconductor fabrication facility, dubbed Fab 7, at its factory site in Yokkaichi, Japan on February 24. The facility will be dedicated to the production of 3D NAND flash memory.
Samsung Electronics has announced mass production of its most advanced line of datacenter SSDs - the PM9A3 E1.S - which fully complies with the Open Compute Project (OCP) NVMe Cloud SSD Specification to satisfy the rigorous demands of enterprise workloads.
IC manufacturing capacity has been tight, resulting in chip shortages that some expect to last into 2020. Shortages amid strong demand are sending product prices up - one of those being MOSFET...
SK Hynix has signed a 5-year contract worth KRW4.75 trillion (US4.3 billion) with ASML to procure extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography systems, local media reports in South Korea quoted the memory chipmaker as saying.
Micron Technology has begun sampling its automotive low-power DDR5 DRAM (LPDDR5) memory that is hardware-evaluated to meet the most stringent Automotive Safety Integrity Level (ASIL) D, according to the company.
Foundry and backend capacity constraints resulting in a global shortage of semiconductors will likely persist through 2022, according to Silicon Motion Technology, a Taiwan-based NAND flash device controller specialist.
Billings among North American manufacturers of semiconductor production equipment topped US$3 billion in January 2021, according to SEMI.
Samsung Electronics has developed high bandwidth memory (HBM) integrated with artificial intelligence (AI) processing power, dubbed HBM-PIM, according to the company. The new processing-in-memory (PIM) architecture brings AI computing capabilities inside high-performance memory to accelerate large-scale...
A rally in DRAM and flash memory prices will boost Winbond Electronics' memory business revenue in March and April, according to Pei-Ming Chen, president for the specialty DRAM and NOR flash chip specialist.
China remains largest IC market
China became the largest IC market in the world in 2005 and has continued to grow in size since then. In 2020, China's IC market increased to US$143.4 billion, a 9% gain from US$131.3 billion in 2019, according to IC Insights.
Kioxia, Western Digital announce 6th-gen 3D flash memory
Kioxia and Western Digital jointly announced they have developed their sixth-generation, 162-layer 3D flash memory technology.
Winbond posts profit growth in 2020
Specialty DRAM and NOR flash chipmaker Winbond Electronics has reported net profit grew 5.7% sequentially to NT$350 million (US$12.53 million) in the fourth quarter of 2020. Net profit for the year came to NT$1.3 billion, rising 3.8% from 2019, with EPS reaching NT$0.33.
Automakers are desperate for support from foundry partners to ease chip shortages disrupting their production, and they are willing to pay extra in return for foundries giving top priority to their orders. TSMC has agreed to give automotive...
Backend firms upbeat about demand for NOR flash
Taiwan-based memory backend specialists are optimistic about demand for NOR flash memory, with clear order visibility through the end of the second quarter, according to industry sources.
Winter storm in US to disrupt chip supplies
The impact of winter storms that struck the US state of Texas could be significant on the world's supply of certain semiconductors, including high-end NOR flash and chips demanding 8-inch wafer fabrication, according to industry sources.
The top-5 wafer capacity leaders saw their combined installed capacity represent 54% of total global wafer capacity in December 2020, according to IC Insights. In 2009, the top-10 wafer capacity leaders held 54% of total global capacity and the top five leaders accounted for 36% of capacity.
IC, materials distributors embracing strong 1Q21
IC and materials distributors have reported strong revenue results for January 2021 and will experience a particularly strong first quarter this year thanks to downstream clients striving to stockpile more inventories amid the increasing chips shortages worldwide, according to industry sources.
Taiwan's IC backend supply chain players are poised to embrace another robust year in 2021 driven by strong demand for 5G and Wi-Fi 6 applications, after logging full capacity utilization in most of 2020 mainly on transfer of orders from clients amid the pandemic and US-China trade tensions, according...
Apple and Samsung remain top semiconductor customers
Apple and Samsung Electronics extended their lead as top semiconductor customers in 2020, according to Gartner.
Revenues soar at memory companies
Most Taiwan-based memory companies delivered significant revenue gains in January from a year earlier, reflecting booming market demand and rising memory prices.
Combined sales of memory products (mainly DRAM and NAND flash chips) by Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix are likely to inch up 0.5% sequentially in the first quarter of 2021, Digitimes Research estimates.
As NAND flash stacking technology continues to advance, vendors will be racing for mass production of 3D TLC/QLC (triple/quad-level cell) NAND chips with over 100 layers in 2021 after sticking to mainstream process for 92/96-layer offerings in 2020, according to industry sources.
Flash device controller IC supplier Silicon Motion Technology expects to post revenues of between US$154 million and US$161 million in the first quarter of 2021, representing a 7-12% sequential increase, with gross margin reaching 48-50% compared with 49.3% in the prior quarter.
Taiwan suppliers of high-end IC substrates, HDI boards, rigid PCBs with high layer counts and flexible...
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