Cypress Semiconductor has said that it will close its 150mm facility, Fab 2, in Round Rock, Texas by late 2008 as it shifts production to smaller geometries at its foundry partners and its more advanced fab in Minnesota. 

SMIC has officially announced the start of production at Fab 8, its newest 300mm fab based at its 200mm fab cluster in Shanghai, China. Construction of Fab 8 began in October 2005 with tool installation beginning in May 2007. According to the company, pilot production commenced in July 2007. 

In what is being touted as one of single largest lease transactions so far undertaken in North America, Qimonda AG has gone public on a $289 million sale and leaseback agreement with Macquarie Electronics for its complete tool set at its 200mm DRAM fab in Richmond, Virginia. 

NXP Semiconductors has said that it has now sold the fab equipment it owned at the Crolles2 R&D and pilot manufacturing fab as part of the Crolles2 Alliance that is disbanding at the end of the year. 

In its efforts to reduce DRAM capacity on 200mm wafers at two existing facilities and with 200mm foundry partners, Qimonda has advised that it is discontinuing 200mm foundry production at both Winbond and SMIC by the end of 2007. 

A recent power outage at Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (ASMC) has meant a major disruption to the foundry, which has had to order replacement quartz and other materials for thermal furnaces and other tools before volume production for customers can be resumed. 

Following on from TSMC’s shock announcement that capital spending would be significantly reduced for 2008 and beyond, UMC has also stated that capital spending would be significantly reduced compared to 2007. 

Chartered Semiconductor noted in a conference call with financial analysts that it expects to ramp 45nm SOI wafers for AMD in the early part of mid-2009. The Singapore-based foundry has also been disappointed by the soft ramp at Fab 7 at the 65nm node but has continued with its capital spending plans in 2007 in anticipation of higher ware runs and improved utilization in the second half of 2008. 

Due to growing demand for its high performance analog and mixed-signal semiconductors, Skyworks Solutions has started the conversion of its internal gallium arsenide heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT) fabrication facility in Newbury Park, California, from 4- to 6-inch wafers as well as expanding partnerships with several leading Taiwanese foundries.