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The shift to a foundry model goes deeper than a new name and logo, according to AMD spin-off Globalfoundries. With official groundbreaking at Fab2 in NY State expected to take place later this week, the new 300mm manufacturing facility has been redesigned since the announced spin-off to increase its capacity and improve tool layout that is both more cost effective and better suited to foundry operations, according to Thomas Sonderman, VP, Manufacturing Systems and Technology at Globalfoundries. Read more >>

Macquarie Electronics has been selected to sell core equipment from Qimonda’s 300mm fab in Dresden Germany, according to an EETimes report. The semiconductor equipment reseller and lease specialist, part of Macquarie bank is to offer selected mainstream tools for sale from Applied Materials, KLA-Tencor, Tokyo Electron, and ASML, the report says. Read more >>

Still in spreadsheet preservation mode after 10 sequential quarters of financial losses, Micron Technology has said that it will maintain capital spending at 2008 levels during its next financial year, which starts next quarter. According to Micron’s CFO, Ronald Foster in a scheduled quarterly conference call to discuss FY3Q09 results, CapEx would be in the range of US$650 million and US$700 million. Spending so far in its current financial year has reached US$566 million, with US$93 million spent in the last quarter. Read more >>

In April, 2009 Chartered Semiconductor noted that demand would bounce back in the second quarter, pushing fab utilization rates into 58% range. At that time the company cited increasing demand for leading-edge devices as the catalyst. In a new update, Chartered now expects utilization rates to be in the range of 61% +/- 2% on the back of growing demand from mature technology customers, rather than leading-edge. Read more >>

Spending of fabs is forecasted to rebound strongly in 2010, after declining 51% in 2009 to its lowest level in 10 years, according to the latest SEMI World Fab Forecast. The latest report also projects capital equipment spending to rocket by as much as 90% in 2010, compared to the low levels expected in 2009. Read more >>

It has been three years since AMD originally announced plans to build its next 300mm fab in upstate New York but now under the guise of spin-off, Globalfoundries, the project is now set for formal groundbreaking in July, 2009. However, the ‘Fab 2’ project is expected to take two years to build and a further 12 to 18 months to ramp. Globalfoundries said that volume production was ‘anticipated in roughly 2012,’ a six year cycle with a yet to be determined end. Ironically, due to the historically low capital spending in the semiconductor industry, Fab 2 is currently the only 300mm fab to start construction in 2009. Read more >>

A new company, named IPDIA, has been created with support from the French Ministry of Economy, Industry & Labor and local authorities as well as over €5 million from NXP, Prime Technology Ventures, Emertec Gestion, Masseran Gestion NCI Gestion and CEA Investissement. IPDIA will use NXP’s Cote de Nacre facility, near Caen in Northwest France to fabricate unique 3D silicon devices. Read more >>

TSMC has finally budgeted capital spending for 2009 as a bottom would seem to have drawn under declining sales and lowered capacity utilization rates in the first quarter of 2009. Capital spending is expected to be in the range of US$1.5 billion, the company said, down from US$1.9 billion in 2009. Capital expenditures for 1Q09 totalled US$166 million. Read more >>

UMC posted a net loss of US$240 million in the first quarter, with revenue of US$319 million on the back of weak demand and extremely low fab utilization rates of only 30%. Capital expenditure for 2009 has been capped at no more than US$400 million, up from US$350 million in 2008. UMC spent US$46 million on CapEx in 1Q09.

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Fully built, staffed and operational, He Jian Technology (Suzhou) Co., Ltd, a 200mm foundry based in China has been acquired by UMC for US$285 million. UMC had previously held a 15% stake in the foundry, given to it by the He Jian as compensation for technology and IP support when the foundry started operations several years ago. Read more >>