0.16um High Voltage Technology Release to Production

Kulim, Kedah – Malaysian-based wafer foundry Silterra Malaysia today announced the release of 0.16um High Voltage Technology for the display driver applications targeting the high resolution TFT panels used in mainstream and high-end mobile devices such as featured cell phones, smart phones, MP3/MP4 players, PDAs and digital cameras.

This latest high voltage technology features the proven 3.17m2 SRAM bitcell which is suitable for the high density embedded memory design in display driver for QVGA (240RGBx320) and WQVGA (320RGBx432, Wide-Quarter-VGA) TFT panels. The new SRAM bitcell offers ~20% total die area reduction as compared with existing high volume display drivers based on 0.18µm technology in the market today. The standby current performance of the latest SRAM Macro with 3.17m2 bitcell has been silicon verified and is meeting TFT panel industry requirement, which is 25 micro Ampere with 1.38Mega bits operates at high temperature 85oC.

In addition, the technology offers enhanced features such as Asymmetry High Voltage Well for denser design, One-Time-Programmable cell for gamma colour tuning, ESD protection and Metal capacitors design guidelines. This technology is fully supported by complete suite of essential IP’s and design kits which enable shorter time to market.

“Right now, we already have several design wins on the 0.16µm High Voltage technology and our customers are satisfied with the initial product yield. With the use of smaller SRAM bitcell on 0.16µm process technology, our customers can design smaller display driver chips very rapidly at lower cost, which are the key competitive advantages to win in the display driver market“, said Yit Loong Lai, Vice President of Worldwide Sales and Marketing.

“As the leader in high voltage technology, Silterra is committed to invest aggressively to advance our high voltage technology roadmap and to expand our capacity to meet customers growing demand. On October 15, we have announced the completion of our $100M Phase 1 expansion plan to increase our existing capacity to 40,000 wafers/month. We have started developing our next generation 0.13m High Voltage technology and we expect to start pilot production with several customers in 1Q 2008.” He added.

About Silterra Malaysia Sdn Bhd:
Market demand driven, Silterra Malaysia Sdn Bhd is a semiconductor wafer foundry offering major foundry compatible CMOS logic, high-voltage and mixed-signal/RF technologies down to 0.13-micron feature size. This includes complete, competitive contract manufacturing for fabless and IDM customers’ designs. Silterra’s wafer fab has a design capacity of 40,000 eight-inch wafers per month.

Environmentally vigilant, Silterra delivers award winning, world-class performance to its customers seeking flexible capacity, competitive advantages and around the clock customer support. Silterra is ISO 9001:2000 and ISO 14001 certified. Founded in 1995, the company’s headquarters and factory are located in Malaysia’s Kulim High-Tech Park, and Silterra has sales and marketing offices in San Jose (California) and Hsinchu (Taiwan).

For additional information on Silterra or its services, please visit www.silterra.com.