Legerity's Flagship High-Voltage (HV7) Process Receives Qualification at Chartered
Legerity Continues Focus on Customers by Transferring Processes to Dedicated Foundry
AUSTIN, TEXAS - June 9, 2003 - Legerity, Inc., a leading provider of analog/mixed-signal integrated
circuits for voice and data networks, today announced that its flagship proprietary high-voltage process, called HV7,
completed qualification after only 9 months for production at Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing (NASDAQ: CHRT and
SGX-ST: Chartered). Legerity's chip sets fabricated upon the HV7 process will begin production immediately at
Chartered.
The need for Legerity to qualify a new manufacturing facility for the HV7 process arose last year when AMD closed the
fab where Legerity had previously outsourced the manufacture of several products. In order to ensure that the fab
shutdown did not affect customers, Legerity chose to partner with Chartered. The decision was based on Chartered's
strong technical team and reputation as a world-class dedicated foundry.
"Chartered is a world-class fab with a great manufacturing track record," said Gary Tanner, Vice President of
Operations for Legerity. "The Chartered transition team is among the most experienced and most technically competent
in the world. It was extremely important to work with such a partner, in order to feel confident that our customers
would not experience any problems during the transition."
Chartered will now manufacture all of Legerity's products based upon the HV7 process. These include the VoiceChip
family, products from the newly formed HPA business, and the products from the acquired Agere Systems business. Also,
the partnership with Chartered will allow Legerity to develop new advanced products.
"Legerity's selection of Chartered as its long-term supplier of choice demonstrates that Chartered has technology
offerings and manufacturing solutions that address the needs of today's fabless companies," said Mike Rekuc,
president of the Americas at Chartered. "In meeting Legerity's aggressive requirements for qualification of the HV7
process in benchmark time, Chartered has demonstrated another success in transferring processes for our customers.
Legerity needed a manufacturing partner that could provide both technology and business solutions that would grow and
evolve with it. We are excited to be working with Legerity and providing the complete, long-term solutions it needs."
Legerity's HV7 process is a 150 V complementary bipolar process technology with high speed (fT > 1GHz) transistors.
The devices in HV7 are dielectrically isolated, increasing packing density and drastically reducing device cross-talk,
which ultimately produces a smaller, lower cost and higher performance die than if traditional junction isolated
techniques were used.
About Legerity, Inc.
Legerity is a fabless analog/mixed-signal semiconductor company providing integrated circuits for high-voltage
interface, signal conditioning, signal processing, and power management applications to more than 400 of the world's
premier communications and consumer electronics manufacturers. Using innovative, proprietary analog and embedded
digital signal processing technologies, Legerity combines its 20 years of experience, bipolar and CMOS process
expertise, analog and digital circuit design capabilities, and more than 600 patents to meet the design challenges
of connecting the world of analog signals with the digital domain. Headquartered in Austin, Texas, Legerity has
offices throughout North America, Europe and Asia. Visit Legerity on the Web at www.legerity.com.
About Chartered
Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing, one of the world's top three dedicated semiconductor foundries, is forging a
customized approach to outsourced semiconductor manufacturing by building lasting and collaborative partnerships
with its customers. The Company provides flexible and cost-effective manufacturing solutions for customers, enabling
the convergence of communications, computing and consumer markets. In Singapore, Chartered operates five fabrication
facilities and has a sixth fab, which will be developed as a 300mm facility.
A company with both global presence and perspective, Chartered is traded on both the Nasdaq Stock Market
(Nasdaq: CHRT) and on the Singapore Exchange (SGX-ST: CHARTERED). Chartered's 3,500 employees are based at
11 locations around the world. Information about Chartered can be found at www.charteredsemi.com.
Chartered Safe Harbor Statement under the provisions of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995
This news release may contain forward-looking statements, as defined in the safe harbor provisions of the U.S.
Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements, reflect Chartered's current
views with respect to future events, and are subject to certain risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual
results to differ materially from historical results or those anticipated. For example: changes in market outlook
and trends; the rate of semiconductor market recovery; economic conditions in the United States as well as globally;
customer demands; the successful implementation of our co-operation with Legerity; the performance level in our
fabrication facilities, continued success in technological advances and competition. Although we believe the
expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are based upon reasonable assumptions, we can give no
assurance that our expectations will be attained. In addition to the foregoing factors, a description of certain
other risks and uncertainties which could cause actual results to differ materially can be found in the section
captioned "Risk Factors" in our Annual Report on Form 20-F filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
You are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which are based on the current
view of management on future events. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking
statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
