TSMC's bold US$100 billion capex plan for the next three years has greatly boosted the confidence of its ecosystem partners about bright prospects for the semiconductor industry, inspiring them to carry out capacity expansions, according to industry sources.

Along with the advancement of foundry processes, demand for advanced chip probing, final test and system-level tests for HPC chips has been gaining momentum, providing new growth opportunities for Taiwan's IC interface solutions providers including Chunghwa Precision Test Technology (CHPT), Keystone Microtech and WinWay Technology, the sources said, and they are all moving to expand capacity for high-end interface solutions to meet increasing demand from first-tier vendors of CPU, GPU and AP chips.

TSMC will continue to invest heavily in advanced foundry and packaging fields, but flip-chip (FC) technology will remain the mainstream technology for medium- and high-end HPCs, the sources said, reasoning that Intel's in-house packaging lines still massively adopt FC-LGA process and many networking HPC chips vendors remain reliant on FC-BGA technology for volume production.

ASE Technology and its affiliate Siliconware Precision Industries (SPIL) have landed big FC-BGA orders for diverse CPU and GPU chips solutions from major vendors, and its 2021 capex will rise to expand capacity to better fulfill such orders and meet persistently robust demand for wire-bonding services, noted the sources.

By: DocMemory
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