Infineon affirms move to 'fab-lite' strategy

Dylan McGrath, EE Times

SAN FRANCISCO -- Dec 1, 2005 — Infineon Technologies AG Chairman and CEO Wolfgang Ziebart affirmed Thursday (Dec. 1) that the company will not build manufacturing capacity below the 90-nanometer node, migrating to a "fab-lite" strategy.

In a phone interview with EE Times, Ziebart, as others have done, openly wondered how many companies would ever operate their own 65-nm, 300-millimeter fabs. Ziebart mentioned Intel Corp. and possibly Texas Instruments Inc., but suggested that few — if any — other companies have sufficient demand to justify the $4-5 billion dollar expense associated with a 65-nm fab.

Ziebart made it clear that Infineon plans to continue operating existing fabs in Germany, France and Malaysia. Ziebart said the company expects the technologies manufactured within those fabs will be in use for "quite a while."

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