Photo Credit: EE Times

Texas Instruments has said it plans to spend up to $1.69 billion expanding its wafer fab in Chengdu, China and adding an assembly and test operation there. The spending is earmarked to be spread over 15 years and could include the acquisition of land, the creation of facilities, and the purchase of manufacturing equipment, TI (Dallas, Texas) said.

The government of Chengdu has promised to give comprehensive support to the expansion plan, TI added saying that it announced the plan alongside officials from the Chengdu Hi-Tech Zone at a conference there last week.

TI purchased the fully-equipped 200-mm facility in the Chengdu High-tech Zone from Cension Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.in 2010. The Chengdu fab was previously operated by Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. on behalf of Cension and TI took on 700 former SMIC and Cension employees that worked at the site and began production of analog ICs. The purchase price of the Chengdu fab was not disclosed at the time. READ MORE