The U.S. and Japan are expanding manufacturing, with SEMI estimating18 new semiconductor plants to be built this year.
TechNews
January 8, 2025
Author Lin Yurou
January 8, 2025
Author Lin Yurou
SEMI International Semiconductor Industry Association released the latest quarterly global wafer fab forecast report today (8th). In 2025, the semiconductor industry will have 18 new wafer fabs under construction, including three 8-inch and 15 12-inch wafer fabs. , most of the factories are expected to start mass production between 2026 and 2027.
SEMI Global Marketing Director and Taiwan President Shih-Lun Tsao said the semiconductor industry is at a critical juncture, with expansion investments driving the development of advanced and mainstream technologies to meet evolving global industry needs. Generative AI and high-performance computing are driving advances in advanced logic and memory, while mainstream processes continue to support key applications in the automotive, IoT, and power electronics categories. The 18 new semiconductor fabs that will be built by 2025 once again demonstrate the semiconductor industry’s determination to support innovation and drive substantial economic growth.
According to SEMI's forecast, North America and Japan will lead other regions with four new plants each by 2025; China and Europe and the Middle East will tie for third place with three plants each, while Taiwan will have two plants, South Korea and Southeast Asia will have one each. after.
According to the 2024 fourth quarter global wafer fab forecast report (covering 2023 to 2025), the global semiconductor industry will have as many as 97 new high-capacity wafer fabs put into production during this period, including 48 in 2024 and 2025. The 32 factories put into use in 2017 have wafer sizes ranging from 12 inches to 2 inches.
In addition, semiconductor production capacity is expected to accelerate further, with an annual growth rate of 6.6% in 2025, reaching 33.6 million wafers per month. This capacity expansion is mainly driven by the continued surge in front-end logic technology in high-performance computing (HPC) applications and the penetration of generative AI in edge devices.
To keep up with the growing computational demands of large language models (LLMs), the semiconductor industry is now racing to build advanced computing capabilities. Chipmakers are actively expanding advanced process capacity (7 nanometers and below), with an annual growth rate that will surpass the industry and reach 16%. By 2025, monthly capacity will increase by 300,000 wafers to 2.2 million wafers.
Mainstream processes (8nm to 45nm) are expected to increase production capacity by another 6%, driven by China's chip self-sufficiency strategy and expected demand for automotive and IoT applications, reaching a milestone of 15 million wafers per month in 2025; mature technology The expansion of process technology (above 50 nanometers) highlights challenges such as slow market recovery and low utilization, and is relatively conservative, with an expected increase of 5%, reaching a monthly output of 14 million wafers in 2025.
Foundry suppliers will continue to lead the way in semiconductor equipment purchases, with foundry capacity expected to grow 10.9% year-over-year from 11.3 million wafers per month in 2024 to a record 12.6 million wafers per month in 2025. round.
As for the memory segment, overall capacity expansion is expected to stabilize and moderate, growing by 3.5% in 2024 and 2.9% in 2025. However, strong demand for generative AI has swept the memory market, bringing about major changes. High-bandwidth memory (HBM) has seen a significant growth, bringing different capacity growth trends to the DRAM and NAND flash memory sectors; the DRAM category will continue to strengthen, with a year-on-year growth of about 7% to 4.5 million wafers per month by 2025 round. 3D NAND device capacity also saw a 5% increase, reaching 3.7 million wafers per month during the same period.
Related link: https://technews.tw/2025/01/08/semi-world-fab-forecast-2025/
Image source: TSMC
【Disclaimer】
The content of this article only represents the author’s personal views and has nothing to do with Creating.
The content, text and originality have not been verified by this website. This website does not make any guarantee or commitment to this article and all or part of its content, authenticity, completeness, or timeliness. It is for readers' reference only. Please verify the relevant content on your own.
Creating Nano Technologies, Inc.
59 Alley 21 Lane 279, Chung Cheng Road, Yung Kang City, Tainan, TAIWAN
TEL:886-6-2323927 FAX:886-6-2013306 URL: http://www.creating-nanotech.com