Taiwanese semiconductor company UMC (United Microelectronics Corporation) is going to launch operation at its 12-inch wafer fab in Xiamen, China, by the end of this year, reported the Commercial Times on April 13. The foundry will mainly make smartphone chips for midrange and value line products, display driver ICs, embedded flash memory for IoT (Internet of Things) application products, and embedded non-volatile memory. Its production capacity will begin at 6,000 wafers per month before scaling up to 50,000 units per month in 2021. UMC is the first Taiwanese firm to build a 12-inch wafer fab in China. The fab is a US$6.2 billion 3-way joint venture between UMC, Fujian Electronics and Information Group, and the Xiamen municipal government.