Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Texas Instruments Inc. said Monday (March 14) that last week's 8.9-magnitude earthquake in Japan badly damaged the company's semiconductor fab in Miho, about 40 miles northwest of Tokyo.
TI said the Miho suffered would not return to full production until mid July at the earliest. The company said plans to restart production at the fab in stages, beginning with several lines in May. The schedule could be delayed if the region’s power grid is unstable or if further complications prevent the re-start of equipment, TI said.
The Miho fab produced about 10 percent of TI’s output as measured by revenue in 2010, of which more than a third was DLP, with the remainder being analog, TI said.
TI said its fab in Aizu-wakamatsu, about 150 miles north of Tokyo, was also damaged in the earthquake. Equipment at the Aizu-wakamatsu fab is being re-started and full production is estimated by mid-April, assuming a stable power supply, TI said.
The earthquake caused damage to numerous fabs, at least a dozen of which remained idle Monday. The loss of capacity and general disruption of the semiconductor supply chain could have profound impact on the global chip industry.
The quake caused damage to the Miho fab's infrastructure systems for delivering chemicals, gases, water and air, TI said. Repairs should be complete in about three weeks, TI said.
The impact of the quake on the Miho fab's production equipment is still unclear because of power outages, TI said. Northwestern Japan has been experiencing rolling blackouts since Japan was rocked by the massive earthquake and subsequent tsunami Friday.
A third TI fab in Hiji, about 500 miles south of Tokyo, was undamaged and is currently running at normal capacity, TI said.
By: DocMemory
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