October 1, 2001 — TOKYO — Although it plans to continue building its new 300 mm wafer front-end manufacturing plant at the NEC Hiroshima site, Elpida Memory Inc. says it is delaying the installation of equipment for nearly a year.
The company had planned to install equipment beginning this December, however that process won’t begin until next September. Officials are blaming the delay on the deterioration of the DRAM market and fallout from the recent terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.
Elpida began as a joint venture between NEC and Hitachi in late 1999. Currently, the company has around 450 engineers working on the development and design of DRAM devices based on 0.13-micron process rule.
The 237,000 square foot facility contains nearly 191,000 square feet of cleanroom space and boats a maximum capacity of 20,000 300 mm wafers per month.