Flash Partners, the joint NAND flash venture between Toshiba and
SanDisk, completed the building of its new fab in Yokkaichi, Japan
today.
After hooking up production equipment, the plant is expected to
start running 300mm wafers in the second half of this year, and to
be producing 10,000 wafers a month by the end of 2005.
"We believe the NAND market will see annual growth rates over 30
per cent from 2004 to 2008, from Yen700bn ($6.7bn) to Yen2.1bn
($20bn)," said Masashi Muromachi, CEO of Toshiba Semiconductor.
“Fab 3 is a testimony to the success of the relationship
between Toshiba and SanDisk, which have pioneered the flash
technology that is enabling so many new applications in consumer
electronics and mobile markets," said Eli Harari, CEO of
SanDisk.
SanDisk will pay for the cost of the production equipment which
usually represents about 80 per cent of the total cost of building
a fab. Total cost, by the end of 2007, when the plant is expected
to reach its current full capacity of 40,000 wafers a month, is
$2.6bn. Further investment could expand capacity to 62,500 wafers a
month.
The initial process technology used will be 90nm, migrating to
70nm in the first half of next year, following the introduction of
70nm on the 200mm line at Yokkaichi during 2005. In late 2006, the
new fab is expected to start running a 55nm process.
Flash Partners is 50.1 per cent owned by Toshiba and 49.9 per
cent by SanDisk. The output from the fab will be shared equally
between Toshiba and SanDisk.
Environmentally conscious design will ensure that the energy
consumed in wafer processing will be 30 per cent lower than that in
Toshiba's current 200mm clean rooms.
According to US analyst iSuppli, Samsung had a 54 per cent
market share in NAND flash in 2004 while Toshiba had 29 per
cent.
www.toshiba.co.jp
www.sandisk.com