Matsushita to produce semiconductors in RI
Matsushita to produce semiconductors in RI
KARAWANG, West Java (JP): The president of PT Matsushita Semiconductor Indonesia broke the ground here on Thursday to start the construction of an assembly plant that will produce two million semiconductors per month.
"Matsushita Semiconductor will produce 700,000 microcontrollers and 1.3 million integrated circuits (ICs) per month in 1998," the company's president, Takeshi Kato, said at the ceremony.
The company, established with a capital of US$60 million, is 65 percent owned by Matsushita Electronics Corporation and 35 percent by Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd., both of Japan. The plant, when operational, is expected to employ 200 workers.
The president of Matsushita Electronics , Kazuhiko Sugiyama, said that all of the plant's products will be exported to neighboring Southeast Asian countries.
He said the plant will be Matsushita's fifth production unit outside Japan after those in Singapore, the United States, China and Malaysia. It will be Matsushita Electronics' largest semiconductor assembly plant in Asia and will focus on producing the leading-edge microcomputer and bipolar ICs.
He added the Malaysian and Singaporean plants produce other sorts of semiconductors such as memory chips.
Indonesia currently has two companies producing semiconductors, PT Omedata in Bandung, West Java, and PT Astra Microtronics Technology in Batam, Riau.
Two other firms, PT Sharp Semiconductor and PT NEC Humpuss Semiconductors Indonesia, also intend to produce semiconductors in 1998.
Sharp Semiconductor, owned by Sharp Corporation of Japan, will produce 20 million ICs and opto-device components per month in its factory, which is also under construction in this town.
NEC Humpuss Semiconductors Indonesia, a joint venture between NEC Corporation of Japan and PT Humpuss Elektronika, will produce 15 million ICs and 100 million signal transistors from its plant, which is under construction in Bekasi, West Java,
State Minister for Investment Sanyoto Sastrowardoyo said in his speech at Thursday's ground-breaking ceremony that investments in the electronics industry have steadily increased.
"Foreign investments approved by the government for the establishment of electronics plants increased to $936.7 million in the period of 1989-1994 from $44.7 million in 1984-1989," Sanyoto said, adding that the period of April 1994 to March 1996 saw the approval of $1.3 billion in investments for the electronics industry.
A U.S. market research agency, Dataquest Inc., said earlier this year that the sales of semiconductors in the Asia-Pacific region grew by 48 percent to $33.5 billion last year from $22.58 billion in 1994.
Sugiyama said that production of electronic equipment using semiconductors as the main components is expected to continue growing rapidly in the 21st century.
He added that Asia is becoming the supply center of such products for the entire world. (kod)