Industry Expert Blogs

Who was Taiwan's first semiconductor company? Who was Taiwan's first foundry? If you said UMC, you are right, but you probably didn't. UMC stands for United Microelectronics Corporation (although people rarely spell it out, they just use the initials). It was created 40 years ago in 1980 as a spinoff from ITRI (the Taiwanese government's research institute). At the time it was not a pure-play foundry, it produced microcontrollers, chipsets, and other products before becoming a foundry service provider in 1995.

UMC has four 300mm fabs, along with several older 200mm fabs.

• Fab 12A in Tainan (Taiwan), with a capacity of 83,000 300mm wafers per month, 0.13um to 14nm.
• Fab 12i in Singapore, with a capacity of 50,000 wafers per month, 0.13um to 40nm.
• Xiamen, China, with a capacity of 50,000 wafers per month (when fully equipped), 65nm to 28nm.
• Kuwana, Mie (Japan) with a capacity of 33,000 wafers per month, 90nm to 40nm (acquired just a few months ago).

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