(October 20, 2010) — Imec Taiwan signed the co-funding contract with the Taiwanese Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) for its R&D activity Imec Taiwan Innovation Centre (ITIC). ITIC’s goal is to expedite applied research projects with industry and academia that will result in electronic designs, components and technology solutions. The new R&D centre will focus on a variety of innovative applications in bioelectronics, MEMS and "green" electronics that are enabled through 3D system/package co-design and system-level evaluation.
The business plan for ITIC forecasts a growth of its research staff to 40+ over 3 years. ITIC is launched with the signing today of an agreement between imec Taiwan and the Institute for Information Industry (III) on behalf of the Taiwanese MOEA. ITIC is financed by imec Taiwan and will be co-funded by the Taiwanese MOEA as a "Multinational Innovative R&D Centre" under MOEA subsidy for the Project of Encouraging Foreign Enterprise Establishing Research and Development Center in Taiwan. The worldwide impact of the Taiwanese semiconductor and consumer electronics industry is unequivocal, and there is an increasing intention of the stakeholders to move up the value chain by entering key innovation areas, say imec representatives. Consequently, Taiwan is an important market for a nanoelectronics R&D centre such as imec. ITIC, being imec’s local R&D centre in Taiwan, will facilitate and intensify the collaboration between imec and the Taiwanese industry and academia.
"The creation of ITIC, two years after having established a representation office in Hsinchu, Taiwan, is essential in our continued efforts to create value for our current and future partners in Taiwan, to leverage our global partnerships, and to actively interact with the Taiwanese ecosystem," said Luc Van den hove, CEO and president of imec and member of the Board of imec Taiwan. "An R&D initiative such as ITIC will intensify imec’s interaction with the local semiconductor and system-level companies and academia."
"As a semiconductor innovative applications centre, ITIC will support the upward shift in Taiwan’s technology value chain and contribute to the realization of Taiwan’s strategic Innovation Plan. It will accelerate open innovation that will result in locally owned IP in the area of intelligent electronics," says Jung-Chiou Hwang, Vice Minister of Economic Affairs, adding that the imec center might attract foreign (European) investment in Taiwan-based high technology as well.
Imec performs world-leading research in nanoelectronics. Further information on imec can be found at www.imec.be.
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