(July 19, 2006) SINGAPORE &#151 Chartered Semiconductor and Singapore’s Agency for Science, Technology, and Research formed a partnership to develop advanced fine-pitch packaging technology, after considering the possibilities for volume ramp with a proprietary backend packaging strategy. In response to the system-on-chip (SoC) product industry, Chartered announced a collaboration with the agency’s Institute of Microelectronics to research packaging solutions for copper metallization and low-k dielectric silicon processes at 65 nm and below.