GOOD FUNDAMENTALS: Demand for memory chips has been soft in the first half due to excessive inventories, but would continue to rise as applications increase, the firm said

Taipei Times
Date: Jun 12, 2018
By: Lisa Wang  /  Staff reporter

Winbond Electronics Corp (華邦電), the world’s No. 3 NOR flash memorychip supplier, yesterday said it is to start building a new fab in September to cope with promising demand for memory chips used in Internet of Things (IoT) applications, cars and big data collection and analysis.

The NT$355 billion (US$11.90 billion) investment plan was given the go-ahead in September last year at a time when demand still outpaced supply after the memorychip market staged a comeback one year earlier. That led to an uptick in chip prices, which raised profits for most memorychip makers.

The Hsinchu-based chipmaker has not invested in a new factory since 2004, deterred by chronic volatility in demand and bouts of oversupply over the past decade.

Winbond is upbeat about memorychip demand over the next decade on the back of a “mega uptrend” created by demand from IoT, cars, cloud computing and big data technologies, Winbond chairman Arthur Chiao (焦佑鈞) told the Chinese-language Apple Daily on the sidelines of the firm’s annual shareholders’ meeting.
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