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SINGAPORE : German semiconductor giant Qimonda is investing more than S$4 billion over five years, to build a wafer fabrication plant in Singapore.
Qimonda is the world's third largest maker of computer memory chips.
This is one of the biggest semiconductor investments in Singapore to date.
The new wafer fab will be Qimonda's first such investment in Asia.
It will have 20,000 square metres of clean room space and produce cutting edge 12-inch wafers to serve the company's clients in Asia.
According to the Economic Development Board (EDB), it will generate 1,500 new jobs.
Lim Swee Nian, Director, Electronics Cluster, Economic Development Board, said, "Typically for a wafer fab of this technology, probably more than half, even two-thirds will be either technicians or engineers. The rest will be operators.
"On top of that, it will contribute a lot of spin-offs down-stream, in terms of new demands for specialty chemicals, gases, and technical support from the fab equipment suppliers."
Qimonda said the new plant is aimed at expanding its front-end capacity, to meet the demands of the fast-growing computer memory chips market.
It will add to Qimonda's network of wafer fabs in Germany and the United States.
The EDB said Qimonda was drawn by Singapore's low taxation rates, competitive infrastructure and highly-skilled workforce.
Mr Lim said, "In a typical wafer fab, depreciation cost accounts for one of the major costs. So in that sense, the key thing is whether the workforce here is able to produce more chips, either through better yield, or through better productivity. I think that will help to offset the higher salaries that they command, and in return, give companies better return, in terms of their utilisation of their expensive capital assets in Singapore.
The Singapore wafer fab will be fully-owned by Qimonda and initially financed by the chip-maker's own cash flow.
Construction of the new facility will begin at the end of the year.
The plant is scheduled to be up and running by 2009, producing 60,000 wafers a month at full capacity. - CNA/ms
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