by Barbara G. Goode, Small Times staff
May 30, 2007 — SVTC Technologies of San Jose, Calif., a process development foundry for established and start-up semiconductor companies, has unveiled a strategic technology incubation program with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), the world’s largest dedicated semiconductor foundry. The deal aims to streamline the transfer of designs from SVTC’s fab to high-volume manufacturing.
“This strategic alliance expands the TSMC ecosystem to enable more innovations by allowing companies, especially those who need special equipment, to develop products at SVTC and transfer accepted business smoothly to TSMC manufacturing,” said Ken Chen, Director of Mainstream Technology Marketing at TSMC.
In March 2007, SVTC spun out from Cypress Semiconductor Corp., and more recently announced its FastXfer Commercialization Services. “The TSMC agreement validates our business model,” Scott Marquardt — SVTC’s new VP of sales, marketing, and strategic business development — told Small Times.
“There are more and more applications in the semiconductor industry being developed which use novel structures and new materials,” stated Dave Bergeron, SVTC Technologies’ CEO. “SVTC is uniquely placed in the emerging value chain to help semiconductor development teams from both fabless and integrated device manufacturers (IDMs) to fully develop their new concepts before taking them into volume production.”
SVTC works to make its services “IP secure” and claims fast turnaround of small lots as a hallmark. “We specialize in production of small lots quickly,” Marquardt noted. And the company is unusual in offering MEMS and CMOS integration on six-inch wafers — although Marquardt is quick to point out that SVTC is not positioning itself as “MEMS centric” and is “not purely CMOS.”
In addition to the TSMC partnership, SVTC announced that it has beefed up its executive-management team with three new vice presidents. Marquardt is among them, having come to SVTC from his former post as senior VP of Asia Pacific sales and marketing for NXP Semiconductors. Lee Dinneen, previously CFO at PerkinElmer Optoelectronics, is now VP and CFO; and Tricia White, formerly of Applied Materials, is SVTC’s VP of human resources.