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2011 Media Coverage |
SEMICON Europa 2011: Hopes for 2012 growth, no room for gloom
ElectroIQ
October 13th, 2011
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SEMICON Europa 2011: Hopes for 2012 growth, no room for gloom
by Barnett Silver, SVP and principal, ATREG
October 13, 2011 - SEMICON Europa got off to a strong start on Monday (10/11) and continued in full swing on Tuesday (10/12). Occupying most of the Messe Dresden, the show has dozens of exhibitors and hundreds of attendees. Some of the most prominent exhibitors on the floor are large firms such as DB Schenker and AMAT, as well as the regional economic agencies. Silicon Saxony is strategically located near the hall entrance with a huge exhibit. New York also has a large presence. The German research institute Fraunhofer also has a large booth highlighting its many interrelated activities in the semiconductor industry.
The overall mood on the show floor is optimistic, yet cautious -- not the abysmal gloom of the SEMICON shows in late 2008 and early 2009. While many firms acknowledge that the industry is in the midst of a correction, most people think or hope it will be mild, and see the industry back on a strong growth track by mid-2012.
Today, the exhibition space is full and crowds are robust. However, in discussions with several tool brokers and resellers, there is a definite consensus that demand for 200mm tools is slowing down. Having said that, that view is not entirely universal and some still see continued solid demand for equipment. Slowdown or not, the opportunity to acquire semiconductor assets on the cheap continues to prove irresistible.
The sessions held at the conference run on a diverse set of mostly technical topics. The program on 450mm wafer production was particularly well attended by many participants who seem to want to understand more about it out of curiosity rather than a need inside their organization to start developing the technology. The consensus view is that only a handful of companies such as Intel, Samsung, or TSMC can possibly afford to develop 450mm production. MEMS is another key focus of the show, with many participants interested in this growing sub-segment of the semiconductor business.
Overall, SEMICON Europa 2011 is a well-attended and vibrant conference, illustrating the continued importance of the semiconductor industry to Europe.
Barnett Silver is SVP and principal of ATREG Inc., a Seattle-based advisory firm to the global semiconductor industry providing objective market analysis, strategic advice, and transaction execution expertise for the disposition and acquisition of operational assets. His background includes mortgage banking and investment banking/debt capital markets. For more information, visit www.atreg.com.
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Buyer of IDT plant likely to keep making chips there
Portland Business Journal
August 29th, 2011
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Buyer of IDT plant likely to keep making chips there
Portland Business Journal - by Erik Siemers
Date: Monday, August 29, 2011, 2:26pm PDT
One chip-maker was looking to go fab-less. Another was looking for a fab.
And now, it seems, the two have met in Hillsboro at the corner of Evergreen and Brookwood.
A happy ending? It’s looking that way, but it’s best not to get ahead of ourselves.
Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Alpha and Omega Semiconductor Ltd. (NASDAQ: AOSL) on Saturday said that by Nov. 15 it intends to buy the Hillsboro semiconductor fabrication plant owned by San Jose, Calif.-based Integrated Device Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ: IDTI) for $26 million.
Assuming the deal happens — and let’s be clear, declaring one’s intent to buy is still a step or two away from actually buying the plant — this is undoubtedly good news for Hillsboro.
IDT announced in August 2009 that it planned to outsource its manufacturing to a company in Taiwan, sparking fears that the 16-year-old, 25-acre campus where it once employed around 400 workers would shutter.
ATREG Inc., the Seattle-based semiconductor industry advisory group hired to market the plant, told the Business Journal in March that it was negotiating with a potential buyer.
It now appears that the suitor was Alpha and Omega, a maker of a broad range of “power semiconductors” that last year grew sales 6.3 percent to $96.8 million.
Officials for the company haven’t returned calls for comment, but others involved in the deal are confident that Alpha and Omega, or AOS, will continue to keep the plant operating at or near capacity.
“It only makes sense if they were going to use the vast majority of the capacity,” said Barney Silver, a senior vice president and principal at ATREG. “My expectation, and IDT’s expectation, is they would continue to use it as it has been used.”
Graham Robertson, IDT’s vice president of corporate marketing, described two companies on divergent paths.
IDT is shifting from having its own factories, to an intermediary step he called “fab-lite,” to completely fab-less.
Alpha and Omega, meanwhile, is currently fab-less on its way to “fab-lite.”
IDT has had a foundry agreement with AOS where it served as a contract manufacturer, making certain AOS products out of the Hillsboro fab.
“When you make products for somebody, you give me your secret recipe and my chefs make your recipe,” Robertson said. “They’ve seen us be able to make their product out of our fab and recreate the recipe.”
The foundry agreement came with an option to buy that can be exercised between Sept. 1 and Nov. 15., and it’s clear that AOS officials liked what they saw.
Though it’s unclear how many jobs might transfer under such a deal — IDT currently employs 275 in Hillsboro — AOS is confident that production can be ramped up quickly.
In a news release, Chief Financial Officer Ephraim Kwok said the ramp-up period should be short since IDT is already making a low volume of the company’s wafers.
CEO Mike Chang said in acquiring a fab of their own, AOS will be able to more quickly roll-out high-value product and respond to customer demands.
“We believe that this acquisition will allow us to accelerate revenue growth and increase gross margin significantly through faster introduction of high-value products and expansion into new serviceable available markets,” Chang said in a news release.
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Freescale sells Scottish fab
EE Times
August 17th, 2011
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Freescale sells Scottish fab
Dylan McGrath
8/17/2011 1:32 PM EDT
SAN FRANCISCO—The Freescale Semiconductor Inc. fab in East Kilbride, Scotland, which ceased chip production two years ago, has been sold, according to a statement issued Wednesday (Aug. 17) by firms that facilitated the sale.
The East Kilbride Campus, which ceased production in 2009, was acquired by Clowes Developments (Scotland) Ltd., an Edinburgh-based real estate developer. Financial details of the transaction were not disclosed.
Freescale has maintained R&D and other activities at the East Kilbride site since the fab ceased production in 2009.
Under the terms of the deal, Clowes acquired Freescale's enitre 800,000-square-foot facility located on 26 acres of land. Freescale will lease back from Clowes 70,000-square-feet of office space for research and development, applications engineering, systems architecture and product engineering.
Clowes' plans for developing the site are not immediately known.
An aerial view of the former Freescale campus in East Kilbride, Scotland, which was sold to real estate developer Clowes Developments for an undisclosed sum.
The fab sale was facilitated by ATREG Inc., a Seattle-based global advisory firm, and its former parent company, Colliers International. The same firms advised Freescale on the 2010 sale of its other Scottish semiconductor facility located in Dunfermline to Shepherd Offshore Services Ltd.
"This is the largest industrial disposal in the West of Scotland for some years, and despite challenging market conditions, we were successful in identifying a local buyer," said Iain Davidson, director of logistics and industrial with Colliers International in Scotland. "The transaction itself was not without its complexities given the scale, nature of the site, and our client’s requirement to lease back part of the site. However, we are delighted to have secured the sale to Clowes Developments."
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ATREG acts as Financial Advisor to Qimonda Dresden
IIFL
June 2nd, 2011
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India Infoline News Service / 16:07 , Jun 02, 2011
The transaction includes a 300mm production fab, a 300mm R&D fab, manufacturing equipment, as well as related support and administrative facilities.
ATREG, Inc. (Advanced Technology Resource Group), a Seattle-based global advisory firm to the semiconductor industry, announced today that it acted as the financial advisor to insolvency administrator Dr. Michael Jaffé on behalf of Qimonda Dresden GmbH & Co. oHG throughout the successful sale of all Qimonda Dresden’s remaining assets. Infineon Technologies AG (ticker symbol: IFX), a leading provider of semiconductor and system solutions addressing energy efficiency, mobility, and security headquartered in Munich, Germany, purchased these assets for €100,600,000. The transaction includes a 300mm production fab, a 300mm R&D fab, manufacturing equipment, as well as related support and administrative facilities.
“We are very pleased with the outcome of this transaction,” explains Barney Silver, senior vice president and principal at ATREG. “By working very closely with both the Qimonda Dresden and the insolvency administrator’s team, we ensured the timely execution of this sale, and reached a positive outcome for all stakeholders concerned.”
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Renesas sells 200mm US fab to Telefunken
Electronic Products and Technology
May 31st, 2011
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Renesas sells 200mm US fab to Telefunken
ATREG Inc. (Advanced Technology Resource Group), a Seattle-based global advisory firm to the semiconductor industry, has acted as exclusive financial advisor to Renesas Electronics America Inc. in the recently announced sale of its 200mm semiconductor fab in Roseville CA to Telefunken Semiconductors International LLC for an estimated US$53 million.
Telefunken will use the facility to manufacture its own analog / mixed-signal high-voltage products as well as products for strategic foundry partners. The buyer has also entered into a supply agreement with Renesas Electronics for manufacturing services at the Roseville factory, and kept the site's entire workforce.
Renesas Electronics had been considering and implementing various measures to improve manufacturing efficiency by promoting larger wafers, finer process node, and production concentration.
"We were on an aggressive timeline for completing this transaction by the end of our fiscal year," explains Yutaka Emoto, executive manager, corporate structure planning department, corporate planning division at Renesas Electronics Corporation based in Tokyo, Japan.
"We are very pleased to see an international company making a significant investment in manufacturing in America," comments Barnett Silver, senior vice president and principal at ATREG. "We are currently witnessing increasing investment in what are perceived as higher-cost regions where semiconductor companies can rely on higher available capacity, more affordable assets, strong IP protection, a highly trained workforce, and wage stability. The Renesas transaction is a perfect example of that unfolding trend."
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Renesas sells U.S. fab to Telefunken
EE Times
March 30th, 2011
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Renesas sells U.S. fab to Telefunken
SAN JOSE, Calif. – Japan’s Renesas Electronics Corp. will sell its semiconductor wafer fabrication facility in Roseville, Calif. to Germany’s Telefunken Semiconductors International LLC for approximately $53 million.
Telefunken intends to utilize the 200-mm fab in Roseville to manufacture its own analog/mixed-signal, high-voltage products and the products for its strategic foundry partners.
The company also will enter into a supply agreement with Renesas Electronics for manufacturing services at the Roseville factory. Under this agreement, it will focus on Renesas Electronics’ current customers without interruption.
The Roseville fab was once owned by NEC Electronics. Renesas assumed control of the fab when it merged with NEC Electronics.
For the most part, Telefunken was an analog and mixed-signal foundry. Last year, it announced a re-entry into merchant integrated circuits market with a focus on power management and high performance Interface. The newly released products are fabricated at Telefunken’s specialty analog fabrication facility in Heilbronn Germany. Proprietary processes such as silicon-on-insulator, a 700 volt high-voltage process and a high-speed silicon-germanium process enable the new devices to meet the highest performance standards at the lowest power consumption.
As reported, Renesas is moving to cut costs. As part of the strategies outlined through its 100-Day Project announced on July 29, 2010, Renesas Electronics ‘’has been considering and implementing various measures to improve manufacturing efficiency by promoting larger wafers, finer process node, and production concentration.’
Renesas planned to cut nearly 10 percent of its workforce, or about 4,000 jobs, by the end of 2010. It is also moving towards a fab-lite strategy. It will use foundries for devices at 28-nm and below. And it will no longer invest in new fabs.
It also spun out its mobile chip group. More recently, the company has been hit hard by the earthquake in Japan.
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Scotland Enjoys Its Largest Commercial Real Estate Transaction since 2008
Knowledge Leader
February 14th, 2011
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Knowledge Leader, 2/14/2011
Colliers International and the global advisory firm Advanced
Technology Resource Group (ATREG ) facilitated the successful sale of Freescale
Semiconductor Inc.’s advanced technology manufacturing campus located in Dunfermline,
Scotland (United Kingdom). The sale of the Dunfermline property is the only
sizeable commercial real estate transaction to have occurred in Scotland since
the end of the fourth quarter of 2008. The success of this project was the result of a combined
global, regional and local marketing effort, as well as the dedication and determination
of all the teams involved.
Built in 1997 by another semiconductor manufacturer, the
campus was not fully completed when purchased, and had never been occupied.
Colliers International, in conjunction with ATREG , worked hand in hand with
Freescale Semiconductor to turn a challenging offering that had been three
years on the market into an attractive proposition for local acquirer Shepherd Offshore
Services Ltd., which is headquartered in Newcastle upon Tyne, U.K.
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