AMD to build massive 32 nm chip factory in New York

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AMD has still room to expand its current manufacturing capabilities in Dresden, Germany and through its contracted manufacturing partners, but a recent surge in demand for its microprocessors apparently has prompted the company to build another high-capacity factory - New York State has won the race and will get a new fab between 2012 and 2014.

The new factory will not only be one of the largest private sector industrial investments in New York State history, but apparently also one of the largest and highest capacity production facilities for microprocessors on a global basis. The new fab, without name so far, is scheduled for construction at the Luther Forest Technology Campus beginning in the time frame between July 2007 and July 2009 and will house a total of 1.2 million square foot of floor space. This size is equal to about 21 football fields and about 21% larger than Intel's currently largest fab (D1D, 989,000 square foot) and about the same size as Intel's currently constructed 45 nm Fab in Kiryat Gat, Israel.

AMD's new 300 mm facility is expected to cost about $3.2 billion - $600 million for the building and $2.6 billion for production equipment. The company expects the factory to become fully operational sometime between the end of 2012 and the end of 2014. The company did not provide details about the expected clean room space and declined to comment on the expected production capacity. However the firm said that its current capacities, including facilities in Germany and Chartered Fab 7, will provide the ability to crank out up to 45,000 wafers per month by 2008, which theoretically translates into a capacity of at least nine million (65 nm) processors per month or just under 110 million processors per year.

The capacity of the new fab will remain speculation for some time; however, AMD is traditionally capable of building more processors per square foot that Intel - which is rumored be manufacturing between 30,000 and 35,000 300 mm wafers per month per fab today.

News source: ieXbeta
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