IME (Institute of Microelectronics) of Singapore's A*STAR (The Agency for Science, Technology and Research) has struck a US$160-million deal with 10 industry partners to set up four joint semiconductor R&D laboratories in the fields of lithography, WLP (wafer-level packaging), metrology and assembly, according to the agency's press release on July 23. The labs will provide an integrated platform for semiconductor R&D, including patterning, 3D IC, quality control, and mass production of chips. The private-sector partners include Applied Materials, Dai Nippon Printing, DISCO, KLA-Tencor, Mentor Graphics, Nikon, Panasonic Factory Solutions Asia Pacific, PINK, Tokyo Electron Ltd. and Tokyo Ohka Kogyo. Over the past two decades, employment in the semiconductor industry in Singapore has more than doubled, from about 15,000 in 1993 to 41,000 in 2013, said the agency.