South Korean chip foundry DB Hitek on Wednesday confirmed that it was planning to expand into 12-inch wafer foundry service.
DB Hitek CEO Choi Chang-shik confirmed as such during the company’s annual shareholders meeting.
Choi said the company is aiming to expand its foundry business’ valuation to 4 trillion won.
As part of this plan, it needs to spend 2.5 trillion won to secure 20,000, 12-inch wafers per month in production capacity, the CEO said.
DB Hitek’s main revenue stream has been its 8-inch foundry business.
The company makes display driver ICs and power management ICs for customers, which enjoyed high demand in the past couple of years.
However, 8-inch foundry is considered a legacy process and to make advanced chips efficiency 12-inch foundry is required.
The larger wafer size of 12-inch offers more chips per wafer, making it more economically viable to make advanced chips.
Despite high demand for its foundry service, DB Hitek stayed competitive by upgrading its equipment used in 8-inch foundry fabs.
However, the CEO said a specific timeline is yet to be set on when the company will start constructing its 12-inch fab.
