Japan is hoping to receive an investment of 1 trillion yen ($9.2 billion) from chip maker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC) and Sony Group
Sony Semiconductor Solutions Corporation has begun operations on the production lines at the new fab built on the premises of Nagasaki Technology Center, a production center owned by Sony Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation. The new fab, dubbed Fab 5, as per Sony, will be utilized for the mass production of CMOS image sensors.
Going forward, Sony Semiconductor Solutions plans to expand production facilities at Fab 5 in line with market trends, thereby further building out its CMOS image sensor production infrastructure to allow Sony to continue to deliver CMOS image sensors mainly for application in the smartphone camera market.
Nagasaki TEC serves as a production center for CMOS image sensors for smartphones, the main product line within Sony’s Imaging & Sensing Solutions business. The news has come at a time when South Korea is busy envisaging a new plan towards becoming the biggest name in the Semiconductor Fabrication.
Japan, as per several media reports, is also hoping to receive an investment of 1 trillion yen ($9.2 billion) from chip maker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC) and Sony Group to build Japan’s first 20 nanometre chip foundry.
This expected factory would be built in southwest Japan, near Sony’s image sensor plant, although further details on the proposal or when it was made were not disclosed. Both Sony and TSMC have declined to comment on the matter.
Japan’s most advanced semiconductor plant is a 40 nanometre chip factory operated by Renesas Electronics Corp near Tokyo. A 20 nanometre chip is more powerful as it packs more transistors into a smaller space.
Considering the ongoing chip crisis and the subsequent argument that Taiwan held too much power over chip production since most of the world’s chip come from Taiwanese chip foundries like TSMC, countries like US and Japan have begun to seriously ramp up local production in the country in order to make themselves more self-reliant and also curb the possibility of a future crisis of such nature.
Japan Hoping For $9.2 Billion Investment From TSMC And Sony For 20-Nanometre Chip Plant: Report
