SINGAPORE -- January 14, 1998 -- Lucent Technologies Microelectronics Pte. Ltd. and Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing Ltd. today announced the formation of a US $1-billion-plus joint venture here to manufacture integrated circuits. Called Silicon Manufacturing Partners Pte. Ltd., the joint venture will eventually employ about 800 people.

The joint venture company will manufacture a variety of integrated circuits using process technology developed by Lucent’s Bell Laboratories as well as technologies developed by Chartered.

The alliance between Lucent and Chartered helps each company to reduce the capital-intensive investment of building a wafer fabrication facility and to meet growing worldwide demand for advanced integrated circuits. Wafers from the fab will be used by Lucent’s global customer base in such products as computing equipment, cellular phones, and other electronic devices. Chartered will use its portion of the capacity to support its customers around the world.

"As one of the fastest-growing semiconductor businesses in the world, our alliance with Chartered provides critical resources and flexibility to better meet our customers’ needs," said John Dickson, president of the Microelectronics Group of Lucent Technologies Inc. "We are pleased to be working with a company that is recognized for its leadership in semiconductor manufacturing and to have the opportunity to increase our presence in a region that is so pivotal to our continued growth." Dickson added that approximately one-third of Lucent’s semiconductor revenues came from the Asia-Pacific region in 1997. The joint venture company will be located on Chartered’s semiconductor fabrication campus at the Woodlands Industrial Park in Singapore.

Tan Bock Seng, president and chief executive officer of Chartered, said, "Today’s increasingly complex superchips require companies to work more closely together than ever before. For Lucent and Chartered, Silicon Manufacturing Partners accomplishes this purpose. By building on complementary core competencies in process development and wafer manufacturing technologies, we can deliver higher-performance ICs more quickly than by going it alone. And our respective customers all stand to gain. We are excited to be aligned with a world leader like Lucent and look forward to the opportunities this relationship will bring."

George Burns, president of the research firm Strategic Marketing Associates, commented on the venture saying, "This new joint venture in Singapore represents a major evolutionary step for the foundry industry and a win-win situation for both companies. Lucent gains a wafer fab and additional capacity with world-class processing capability in a short time. Chartered gains by expanding its portfolio of manufacturing process technology, while giving its customers access to some of the world’s best technology from Lucent. This move definitely vaults Chartered into the front rank of foundry suppliers."

Lucent Technologies Microelectronics Pte. Ltd. will own 51 percent of the joint venture company with Chartered owning 49 percent. Both companies will share the facility’s production output, which is scheduled to begin in the fourth quarter of this year.

Initially, the joint venture company will produce 8-inch wafers using 0.25-micron processing technology, which means the smallest features on these chips are just 1/500th of the width of a human hair. At full capacity, the facility will produce 26,000, 8-inch wafers per month. The venture expects to migrate to 0.18-micron processing technology by the year 2000.

Lucent has approximately 1,400 employees in Singapore, with a Lucent Technologies Microelectronics Group semiconductor assembly and test facility and a Bell Laboratories research and development facility located here. Other Lucent businesses operating in Singapore include the Global Service Provider Business, Wireless Networks, Network Products, Business Communications Systems, Data Networking Systems, Optical Networking, and Switching and Access Systems.

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