联电南科厂动土，2013下半年装机

在一个温暖、阳光明媚的日子，联电(UMC)砸下2,400亿兴建的南科 Fab 12A 新厂正式动土。据表示，新厂完工时每月产能将达五万片 300mm 晶圆，最初将采用 28nm 制程，随后将转移到 20nm 和 14nm 制程。该公司预计2013下半年开始装机。 该厂将包含53,000mm^2M的无尘室──该面积足够容纳十座足球场。这座新厂将座落在联电现有的高阶晶圆厂旁，目前这座晶圆厂已开始量产28nm Poly SiON制程，并已出货了数千片使用该制程的晶圆样品。联电CEO 孙世伟预估，今年底28nm技术将占其总销售额的5%。 IC Insights 总裁Bill McClean表示，联电下一季销售预估可上升15%，这个成长幅度相当引人瞩目，但仍然低于其竞争对手台积电(TSMC)预估的20%销售额成长。

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包括三百多家供货商、合作伙伴，以及台湾政府官员，都希望台湾最重要的晶圆制造业务能持续成长。 尽管像Nvidia和高通(Qualcomm)等公司非常渴求28nm制程，但由于这些公司需要最新的制造技术，因此，他们目前仍然是竞争对手台积电手中的客户。目前尚不清楚联电的Poly制程是否量产，或是他们宁愿选择今年底前才会试产的high-k金属闸极版本。

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去年底，联电被 GlobalFoundries 小幅超越，失去晶圆代工第二名的位置。像McClean这类市场观察家则指出，联电最终将下滑到第四名。 “台积电仍是龙头，而 GlobalFoundries 和三星(Samsung)则将争夺第二的位置，”McClean说。“长远来看，联电会发现愈来愈难在技术上维持领先，”他表示。

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然而，孙世伟和联电有着自己的立场，这家公司不会试着击败台积电，而是专注于紧密的客户服务。 孙世伟对于被McClean这类分析师贴上“快速跟随者”(fast follower)的卷标不予置评。“这个产业中每个人都是跟随者，我们都跟随着英特尔的技术和生产能力，”他表示。 联电仍拥有超过其最新厂房面积的土地，有朝一日，它可以在需要时建造更大型的晶圆厂。但问题在于，这家公司是否具备建厂所需的数十亿美元。 联电目前的财务状况看起来还不错。孙世伟表示，该公司的负债/权益比为20%，如果需要更多资源，还可以提高到30%。此外，联电最近也表示正在研究一个高达6亿美元的私募股权投资案。 联电还必须解决许多问题。这家公司必须证明他能量产迄今仅提供测试芯片的20nm制程、开发14nm制程，包括FinFET在内，而且必须加快2.5D和 3D芯片的开发脚步。另外，该公司也同样面对转移到450nm晶圆以及超紫外光(EUV)微影技术的挑战，二者都意味着更庞大的投资。 目前，联华缺乏像台积电般的产量、像GlobalFoundries的阿布达比金钱支援，以及像Samsung和IBM等共同开发共享平台的合作伙伴支持。 另外，台湾法规也限制了联电的发展。根据法令，公司的外国股权不能超过10%。这家公司也面临着与中国合作关系的限制。 因此，联电必须寻找能够解决技术、商业和政策面问题的方法，才能让未来的发展道路更加清晰。而就在动土当天，阳光如此明媚、温暖，看起来，似乎也代表了今年应该是个好年头的预兆。 编译： Joy Teng 本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载

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{pagination} Slideshow: Sun shines on UMC's new fab Rick Merritt TAINAN, TAIWAN – It was a good day in a good year for United Microelectronics Corp. Taiwan’s second largest foundry officially broke ground on its latest and largest fab to date. When complete, the $8 billion factory—known as Phase 5 and 6 of Fab 12A--will spit out up to 50,000 300 mm wafers per month starting at 28 nm and eventually moving to 20 and 14 nm processes. The company expects to start installing equipment in the second half of 2013. The fab will contain 53,000 square meters of clean room space—enough to house ten football fields. It will cost UMC as much as it has spent to date on two previous generation fabs that are part of the same complex here. The new plant sits next to UMC’s current high-end fab where the company is ramping up a 28 nm Poly SiON process. The existing fab has already shipped thousands of sample parts using the process, and by the end of the year UMC will log as much as five percent of its sales in 28 nm technology, said chief executive Shi-Wei Sun. The dynamics are driving the company’s upbeat forecast that sales will be up about 15 percent in its next quarter. That’s significant but less impressive than the 20 percent sales growth its rival, the much larger TSMC forecasts, said Bill McClean, president of IC Insights. More than 300 vendors, partners and local dignitaries turned out to wish the island nation’s oldest foundry well on the latest chapter of its growth. Like all such high risk operations at the heart of the electronics industry, it will need all the luck it can get. Although companies such as Nvidia and Qualcomm are crying for 28 nm technology today, they are mainly customers for rival TSMC due to their need for the latest technology. It’s not clear either would use the poly version UMC is ramping now or would prefer the high-K metal gate version it won’t have in pilot production until late this year. It’s anyone’s guess what the demand could be like in two years when the $8 billion plant needs to start paying back on its investment. Larger questions hang over UMC’s long term horizon. The company officially lost its position as a distant second to TSMC late last year when GlobalFoundries edged ahead in quarterly revenues. Market watchers like McClean believe the company will eventually slip to number four. “I still see TSMC as the leader with GlobalFoundries and Samsung fighting it out for number two,” said McClean. “Over the long run, [UMC] is going to find it increasingly difficult to keep up with leading-edge technology,” he said. More than 300 visitors gathered under tents next to UMC's current high-end fab for the groundbreaking ceremonies. Clouds on the horizon As part of a relatively new group of top management that came up the ranks at UMC, Shi-Wei Sun knows his company’s position well. It will not try to beat TSMC, but instead focus on serving customers with closely aligned road maps. Sun shrugs off the negative implications of being tagged a “fast follower” by observers such as McClean in a semiconductor industry where the leaders take the biggest share of the profits. “Everybody in this industry is a follower, we all follow Intel’s technology and manufacturing capability,” he said in conversation after the groundbreaking. UMC has a patch of land beyond its latest construction site where it can someday build a potentially larger fab, its planned Phase 7 and 8. But the big question is whether a #4 player can accumulate the double-digit billions such a plant would require. Currently UMC’s financials look good. The company is funding the current project on its own through a bond issue and other reserves. It has a 20 percent debt to equity ratio and could push it to 30 percent if it needed more resources, Sun said. In addition, the company recently announced it is exploring a private equity investment of up to $600 million. The company will need all that and more to tackle the issues on its horizon. It must get into production a 20 nm process so far demonstrated in a test chip, develop a 14 nm process that includes FinFETs and come up to speed on the new and complex areas of 2.5 and 3-D chip making where it currently manages two collaborative efforts. In addition, it faces a long term migration to 450mm wafers and extreme ultraviolet lithography, both of which carry hefty price tags. Currently, UMC lacks the volumes of TSMC, the deep pockets of GlobalFoundries’ Abu Dhabi backers and the multi-company development support of the Common Platform partners such as Samsung and IBM. UMC is also hamstrung by the policies of its local Taiwan government. It cannot accept foreign equity ownership of more than 10 percent. And it faces restrictions on any collaboration with China, its near and deep-pocketed neighbor that is hungry to establish leading-edge process capabilities. Just how UMC will find its way around the technical, business and policy hurdles ahead is anything but clear. But just for today, the weather in Tainan was warm and sunny, smiles and hearty handshakes were all around and it looks like a good year ahead. The new fab site is already under development (left) as guests arrive for a formal groundbreaking ceremony.