On December 1, the world's third largest silicon wafer manufacturer, GlobalWafers, held a ground-breaking ceremony for its GlobalWafers America 12-inch wafer plant in Sherman, Texas, the first silicon wafer plant to open in the United States in 20 years.
Global Wafer emphasized that the current Texas silicon wafer plant in the United States is expected to complete the construction of the current plant, equipment installation, customer sample delivery and mass production within two years. The original Texan silicon Fab covers an area of 58 hectares and is expected to provide ample space for future phased expansion.
According to previous data, Global Wafer's current 12-inch silicon wafer plant is expected to open in 2025, with a maximum monthly production capacity of 1.2 million 12-inch silicon wafers, which will solve the wafer shortage problem that led to the semiconductor crisis, and serve the nearest heavyweight factories such as TSMC, Intel and Samsung.Here we have TT-Electronics-Welwyn-LRF3W-R01FW.
Although officials did not disclose the amount of investment, industry estimates had pegged the initial investment at least NT $10 billion.
12-inch silicon wafers are becoming mainstream
As we all understand, 12-inch silicon wafers are essential to any advanced semiconductor manufacturing plant. With global giants like GlobalFoundries, Intel, Samsung, Texas Instruments and TSMC announcing plans to expand production, the global semiconductor industry chain for high-quality upstream material - silicon wafer demand will also grow significantly.
According to SEMI, the global semiconductor wafer shipment area reached 14.16 billion square inches in 2021, and the wafer market size reached a record high of $12.62 billion. According to the SEMI report, global semiconductor wafer shipments are expected to climb to higher levels in 2023.
In terms of size, terminal markets such as mobile communication and computers continue to develop rapidly. 12-inch silicon wafers are gradually becoming the mainstream products in the semiconductor silicon wafers market. The shipping area has expanded from 94 million square inches in 2000 to 9.598 billion square inches in 2021, and the market share has increased from 1.69% to 68.47%. Its market share is expected to reach almost 70% by 2022.
Meanwhile, shipments of 12-inch wafers are growing in tandem with downstream demand, which is projected to reach 7.5 million wafers/month by the end of 2021 and 9.1 million wafers/month by 2025, according to SUMCO's global 12-inch wafer demand forecast.
Silicon wafer manufacturers to "grab" capacity
In the face of strong demand, global manufacturers are also accelerating the expansion of 12-inch silicon wafer production capacity.
In terms of major overseas companies, the world's top five semiconductor wafer manufacturers have all announced 12-inch wafer production expansion plans in the past two years.
In addition to the current U.S. plant, Global Wafer (No. 3 in the world) announced plans in March to expand its 12-inch plant in Italy. The company noted that its Italian subsidiary, MEMC SPA, will have a fresh 12-inch production line at its existing plant and will be the first 12-inch fab in Italy, which is expected to open in the second half of 2023.
Shin-etsu Chemical (No. 1 in the world) announced in February that it would invest more than 80 billion yen ($600 million) in equipment in its silicon wafer business;
another Japanese semiconductor wafer manufacturer, Katsuko (the world's second largest), announced plans at the end of 2021 to spend 228.7 billion yen to expand its 12-inch semiconductor wafer production capacity, with a plan to put it into full production by 2025;
SK Siltron, the world's fifth largest chipmaker, announced in March this year that it will invest 1.05 trillion won over the next three years to expand its 300mm wafers and start mass production in the first half of 2024.
Germany's Siltronic, the world's fourth largest, announced in October that it planned to invest about 2 billion euros to expand production of 300mm wafers in Singapore by 2024.
At present, enterprises in mainland China with 12-inch silicon wafer production lines mainly include Shanghai Silicon Industry, Zhonghuan Corporation, LionMicro, Zhongxin Wafer, etc.
The raised project of Shanghai Silicon Industry, "Research and Development and Advanced Manufacturing Project of 300mm high-end silicon Wafer for integrated Circuit Manufacturing", will be implemented by its subsidiary Shanghai Xinsheng. Based on the initial production capacity of 300,000 wafer/month, a further increase of 300,000 wafer/month will be made.
By the end of 2021, CMC has formed a 12-inch production capacity of 170,000 pieces/month, and plans to build a production capacity target of 600,000 pieces/month by the end of 2023.
By the end of 2021, the 12-inch silicon wafers in Liang Quzhou base have reached a monthly production capacity of 150,000 wafers, and a monthly production capacity of 100,000 wafers is under construction.
In addition, Zhongxin Wafer, which is entering the Science and Technology Innovation Board, has started the 12-inch large silicon wafer production expansion plan in 2021, and is making follow-up investment in the 12-inch semiconductor silicon wafer production line project. It is planned that the 12-inch silicon wafer production capacity will reach 200,000 pieces per month by the end of 2022.