Japan's Elpida Memory has
inked DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory) foundry deals with Taiwan's ProMOS
Technologies and Winbond Electronics, Nikkei reported. Elpida is expected to
transfer advanced DRAM process and product technologies to ProMOS in exchange
for manufacturing capacity at ProMOS's Taichung 300mm wafer fab. The capacity
will be utilized for the production of Elpida's 1Gb DDR3 (Double Data Rate 3)
device. Completion of production trials is slated for the first half of 2010
and mass production for the second half of the same year.
As for the foundry collaboration
with Winbond, the two companies have signed a memorandum of understanding for
Winbond to supply GDDR3 (Graphics DDR3) and GDDR5 DRAMs to Elpida. The two
companies have teamed up for the commercialization of said products prior to
the present agreement, and Winbond expects to begin commercial production by
year-end 2009. Beginning in the first half of 2010, Elpida is scheduled to
purchase the output provided by Winbond and sell the products under Elpida's
corporate brand name.