According to China Taiwan Economic Daily reported on February 17, Infineon, Renesas, Texas Instruments (TI), Rapidus and other automotive chip makers are starting to cover the new fab plans, the industry estimates that the amount of investment in the four industry expansions look at $ 25 billion, fear of cutting both TSMC, UMC and other foundry outsourcing orders.

Automotive chip makers enthusiastically build plants
February 16, Infineon said it has been approved to build a chip factory in Dresden, Germany, the plant will produce power semiconductors and analog / mixed-signal components, scheduled to go into operation in 2026. The new plant will cost 5 billion euros ($5.35 billion), the largest single investment case in Infineon's history.

It is reported that the German Ministry of Economic Affairs approved the early project of the plant, Infineon can start construction early before the EU Executive Committee completed the relevant review.

On the same day, Texas Instruments said it will build a second 300mm semiconductor wafer fabrication plant in Leehaven, Utah, as part of the company's $11 billion investment in Utah. The second facility, when completed, will be combined with the existing facility and eventually operate as one plant. The new construction is scheduled to begin in the second half of 2023, with production starting as soon as 2026.

In 2021, Texas Instruments successfully acquired LFAB, a 12-inch fab located in Lihai, and put into production at the end of 2022, which can support 65nm and 45nm production technology to manufacture analog and embedded processing chips, and products can be used in renewable energy, electric vehicles, space telescopes and other fields.

Also according to TV Tokyo on February 15, Japanese chipmaker Rapidus is considering building a chip factory in Hokkaido, northern Japan, and may formally decide on the site of the new factory as early as the end of February.

In August 2022, Toyota, Sony (Sony), NTT, NEC, Softbank (Softbank), Denso, Armor Man and other eight Japanese companies jointly funded about 7.3 billion yen to set up Rapidus. at the same time, the Japanese government will also invest 70 billion yen in Rapidus, the plan is to start mass production of advanced logic chips around 2027, these chips can be used in areas such as autonomous driving and artificial intelligence (AI).

In mid-February, ON Semiconductor announced that it had successfully acquired GlobalFoundries' 300mm wafer fab in East Fishkill (EFK), New York, for a total consideration of $430 million, effective December 31, 2022, and held a ribbon-cutting ceremony.

Hassane El-Khoury, president and chief executive officer of ON Semiconductor, said. "With the addition of EFK, ON Semiconductor will have the only 12-inch power discrete and image sensor facility in the U.S., enabling accelerated growth in the megatrends of automotive electrification, ADAS, energy infrastructure and factory automation."

Targeting $200 billion pie in automotive chips
Morgan Stanley pointed out that in 2018 the global automotive electronics market of about $ 150 billion, is estimated to explode growth to $ 287 billion in 2025, mainly due to the continued increase in the penetration of electric vehicles, coupled with the use of advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) increased, is expected in 2025 among the material costs of electric vehicles, up to 35% to 45% for automotive electronic components, is 2.5 times the traditional car. The overall growth in demand for automotive electronics is expected.

Foundry UMC has stressed that the automotive chip is indeed one of the focus areas and spine of the layout of special processes. Last year, the media reported that UMC has obtained Infineon, NXP, Texas Instruments, Microchip Technology and other automotive chip makers, eight key areas of automotive certification have arrived, these customers in the global automotive chip market share of the total of more than 30%.

UMC took the eight key automotive chip field certification, covering power semiconductors, WiFi / Bluetooth and other wireless communication applications, millimeter wave radar sensor (Radar sensor), Auto AP, microcontroller (MCU), CIS sensor, OLED / LCD driver IC, MEMS sensors, etc., these certifications allow UMC to eat through the global first-tier car manufacturers chip orders.

According to Taiwan media reports, in recent years, automotive chip makers in order to shorten the delivery time, directly to the foundry to approach cooperation, especially the next generation of automotive IC design is more complex also requires more high-end or special semiconductor process support. With these IDM factories to build their own capacity, is bound to cut outsourced foundry orders, and affect the wafer duo to receive orders.

The leading foundry TSMC previously in response to the automotive chip shortage, but also to increase the relevant capacity support. With the semiconductor inventory adjustment and large factory capacity gradually open, TSMC President Wei Zhejia had foretold in the law meeting, this year's demand for automotive semiconductors will continue to increase, but the shortage should soon be eased.