Taiwan’s four major DRAM chipmakers are expected to spend US$3.3 billion in capital expenditure (capex) in 2005, up 30.8% from 2004, despite forecasts predicting slower growth for the DRAM industry next year, according to executives from the four firms.

Among the four firms, Inotera Memory, Powerchip Semiconductor Corporation (PSC) and ProMOS Technologies plan to invest most of their budget in expanding their 12-inch capacity. The expansion is expected to boost Taiwan’s total 12-inch capacity for DRAM production by 83% to 154,000 12-inch wafers per month by the end of 2005.

PSC plans to invest two-thirds of its capex in building capacity at its second 12-inch fab, with the remainder allocated for its existing fabs, a company executive said.

ProMOS will dedicate its capex to its second 12-inch fab, which will begin processing chips using 90nm process technology in 2005, according to Ming-liang Chen, company president.

Nanya will only budget US$260 million for its own production, mainly for maintenance of its existing 8-inch fabs. However, the firm will budget more funds to ramp Inotera’s capacity, according to Nanya spokesperson, Pei-lin Pai.
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Source : DigiTimes