Foxconn, "also known as Hon Hai Precision, aims to launch a $9 billion fab near southern China’s Zhuhai city... The total amount of the investment in the project could add up to around 60 billion yuan, or $9 billion, with most of the investment coming from the Zhuhai government.
Initially, Foxconn is expected to draw on Sharp, which has experience making CCD/CMOS sensors... [and] has operated an 8-inch fab in Fukuyama at the 0.13μm process node. Foxconn’s 2016 takeover of Sharp provides the ability to design and produce semiconductors for the first time in Foxconn’s history as it shifts from electronics assembly to higher margin chip production.
“One of the Hon Hai group’s goals when acquiring Sharp was to gain semiconductor technology,” Tokyo-based Mizuho Securities analyst Yasuo Nakane told EE Times... chip projects are financed partly by China’s central government, which sees semiconductors as a more important field, Nakane said.
The main hurdle for the China fab project is likely to focus on securing intellectual property and engineers. “If Sharp were to invest in a 12-inch wafer plant in China, we doubt it would begin operations using processes several generations old, and we think it currently lacks enough engineers for the task,” Nakane said... The new fab will initially make chips for ultra high-definition 8K televisions and camera image sensors, as well as various sensors for industrial use and connected devices."
Hmm.. Seems akin to buying Sears and Kmart in order to pick up expertise in retailing, and then opening a glitzy 5th Avenue storefront.
ReplyDeleteAmerican..... Just what did they say about Japanese cars? Last I heard 5MP CIS still having brisk sales. Some of the CIS guys are quite contented making the silicon, and sending them to CMI in China, make sense to make them all in one place, where else but China.
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