A consortium of companies announced the construction of a new semiconductor factory in Europe. Formed by TSMC, Infineon Technologies, NXP Semiconductors e Robert Bosch, the group intends to expand the foundry of advanced chips for the industrial and automotive sectors with the opening of the European Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (ESMC). This step, as can be understood, is part of the larger project linked to theEuropean Chips Act. Let's see the details.
TSMC, Infineon Technologies, NXP Semiconductors and Robert Bosch: the joint venture for chips produced in Europe
TSMC, the semiconductor market leader, owns 70% of the joint venture. The other companies will have a 10% stake each. The project was created under the European Chips Act, which provides €43 billion in grants for the development of the chip industry in Europe. According to a statement released on Tuesday, ESMC will be built in 2024 and the expectation is that its mass production operations will start in 2027. The total investment in the venture is €10 billion, generating around 2.000 jobs in the high-tech sector.
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Located in Dresden, in Germany, the factory will have the capacity to produce 40.000 12-inch silicon chips per month, which will be used to produce chips with the 28/22-nanometer CMOS lithography and 16/12-nanometer FinFET already maintained by TSMC.
While some of these processes have been in use for over ten years, the purpose of the factory is not to produce processors for mobile phones or graphics cards. Instead, older lithographs are ideal for producing microcontrollers used in modern cars, as well as memories for embedded systems and image sensors.
The initiative could be a way to revive the automotive industry European. The semiconductor crisis, which hit the market in the peak years of the coronavirus pandemic, has had a significant impact on vehicle production. With an in-house supply chain, automakers will have more security in their business.
