Amkor, Apple plan for chip packaging plant in Arizona

News | December 4, 2023

By Peter Clarke

Interconnect & cables Analog Materials & processes

Amkor Technology Inc. (Tempe, Arizona) is planning to build an advanced packaging and test facility in Peoria, Arizona, with CHIPS Act funding being key.

The company has worked closely with Apple, which will be the first and largest customer for the facility, Amkor said. The plant is expected to be ready for a first phase of production within two or three years when it will package and test integrated circuits produced for Apple at the nearby TSMC fab.

Amkor added that the advanced packaging facility would provide the US with a resilient domestic semiconductor supply chain and said that by the time the project is completed it will have invested US$2 billion and be employing 2,000 people. Upon completion, this will be the largest outsourced advanced packaging facility in the US.

CHIPS money is ‘critical’

Amkor has secured approximately 55 acres of land and plans to build a manufacturing campus with more than 500,000 square feet of clean room space. Amkor has applied for CHIPS Act funding from the US government and said that this would “critical to the plan moving forward.”

“Amkor has been a strategic OSAT partner to TSMC for many years,” said CC Wei, CEO of TSMC, in a statement issued by Amkor. “TSMC applauds Amkor for investing in the future of the semiconductor industry with us in Arizona.”

“Apple is committed to help build a new era of advanced manufacturing, right here in the US,” said Jeff Williams, COO of Apple, in the same statement. “Apple and Amkor have worked together for more than a decade packaging chips used extensively in all Apple products, and we are thrilled that this partnership will now deliver the largest OSAT advanced packaging facility in the United States.”