Chinese-owned wafer maker to invest $400 million in Finland
Silicon wafer manufacturer Okmetic Oy (Vantaa, Finland) has said it will invest €388 million (about US$400 million) to build a fab in Finland and double its production capacity.
Okmetic was acquired by the National Silicon Industry Group (Shanghai, China) in 2016. Okmetic employs around 600 people and had net sales in 2021 of €128 million (about US$135 million).
Okmetic announced it will build a facility next to its current silicon wafer fab in Vantaa, Finland creating more than 500 jobs. Construction is due to begin early in 2023 with production starting during 2025.
Okmetic supplies a range of 150mm- and 200mm-diameter silicon wafers, comprising SOI wafers and high resistivity RFSi wafers as well as patterned wafers, polished wafers, through-silicon via wafers and wafers for MEMS and power devices.
Largest investment
The planned investment will be the largest in Okmetic’s history. Over the last five years the company has spent more than €100 million increasing production capacity at its Vantaa number one fab.
The wafer production fab will have 6,000 square meters of clean room area within a shell of 40,000 square meters. The fab will focus on producing single- and double-sided 200mm-diameter polished wafers and on crystal growth. This will allow the existing to focus on silicon-on-insulator wafer production.
“We have experienced strong growth for several years now, and market forecasts suggest the positive development will continue in the semiconductor industry,” said Kai Seikku, Okmetic CEO, in a statement. “In a bigger picture, the investment can also be seen as part of the European push towards more self-sufficiency in the global semiconductor value chain. However, overall focus will be on global markets,” he added.
Chiu Tzu-Yin, president of NSIG and chairman of Okmetic, said: “It will also enable NSIG – the parent company of Okmetic – to play a more prominent role in the global semiconductor silicon wafers supply chain.”
Related links and articles:
News articles:
Okmetic invests €40 million in MEMS wafer production
China takes over European wafer supplier
China buys Swedish MEMS foundry, builds fab
Soitec to expand SmartSiC wafer production in France
LFoundry quietly sold to startup Wuxi Xichanweixin
If you enjoyed this article, you will like the following ones: don't miss them by subscribing to :
