US chip maker shifts production to Taiwan

US CHIP MAKER Cypress Semiconductor is outsourcing some of its memory chip production to Taiwan's UMC, according to Associated Press.

Cypress said that UMC will be among its primary foundry partners for its next-generation static random access memory (SRAM) products.

UMC is the world's second-largest contract microchip manufacturer, however it is the first time that Cypress has outsourced to a foreign foundry.Cypress says it needs someone who can manage the more advanced processes in its SRAM design.

It will tape out its first 65-nanometer SRAM product at UMC in the fourth quarter of this year.

Besides the SRAMs, Cypress will use UMC for the foundry manufacturing of its S8TM 0.13-micron embedded flash technology and two future generations of embedded flash technology. µ