On July 29, 2026, the semiconductor foundry giant UMC announced that its board of directors had approved a phased expansion plan worth a total of 146.86 billion New Taiwan dollars (approximately $4.6 billion). UMC's chairman, Mr. Hung, pointed out that the rise of generative AI has fundamentally reshaped the landscape of the technology industry, and the market's demand for high-performance, high-bandwidth, and highly system-integrated technologies is accelerating. This expansion plan aims to balance speed, flexibility, and capital discipline, ensuring that the company can continuously meet market demands.

Singapore P4 Factory

In Singapore, UMC will utilize the completed but vacant P4 factory building to directly construct clean rooms and purchase equipment, in order to expand its silicon photonics (SiPh) production capacity. Due to the completion of the factory shell, UMC was able to expand promptly and efficiently, significantly shortening the cycle from decision to mass production.

This layout was not from scratch. Just two weeks ago, on July 14th, UMC announced the successful delivery of the first batch of mass-produced silicon photonics wafers from its Singapore 12-inch wafer factory, and the 1.6 Tbps high-bandwidth interconnection solution supported by UMC in collaboration with Singapore-based PIC enterprise SILITH has passed the certification of the world's leading cloud infrastructure customers.

New Factory in Tainan

In Taiwan, UMC has simultaneously initiated the construction of a new wafer fabrication plant in the Tainan Science Park. This plant will serve as the base for the future P7 and P8 facilities. Unlike the direct equipment importation pace in Singapore's P4, the new factory in Tainan is currently focused on building the plant, and equipment investment and production capacity will be determined based on market demand and customer progress in the future.

UMC's Silicon Photonics Technology Roadmap

In the field of silicon photonics, apart from the already mass-produced 1.6Tbps platform, UMC and SILITH are also collaborating to develop a 400Gbps pure silicon photonics platform per channel, using Mach-Zehnder modulator architecture, maintaining the manufacturability of the process compatible with standard CMOS. Additionally, UMC is expected to officially provide its own 12-inch silicon photonics platform in 2027 and work with ecosystem partners to develop ultra-high bandwidth optical interconnection solutions based on lithium niobate thin films.

CONEVO Supplies Electronic Chips

CONEVO, an independent distributor of electronic components, has been deeply involved in the supply of all types of ICs in stock and BOM List assembly. It can also provide domestic alternative solutions to help customers overcome the key nodes of the supply chain from R&D to mass production. The latest inventory of electronic chips supplied by CONEVO:

1. TAJB107M006RNJ/BKN - AVX tantalum capacitor, 100μF/6.3V, suitable for high-density power filtering and decoupling scenarios.

2. EP2AGX45DF29C4N - Intel Arria II GX series FPGA, 45K logic units, suitable for communication infrastructure and image signal processing.

3. SN74HC393PWR - TI dual 4-bit binary counter, low-power CMOS logic, suitable for timing division and pulse counting applications.

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