CHARTERED AND STATS COLLABORATE TO PROVIDE BUMP SORT AND FLIP CHIP ASSEMBLY SOLUTIONS
STATS Joins Chartered's NanoAccess Alliance;
Targets advanced technology requirements for turnkey chip assembly solutions
MILPITAS, Calif. and SINGAPORE - September 18, 2003 - Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing (Nasdaq: CHRT and SGX-ST: Chartered), one of the world's top three dedicated semiconductor foundries, today announced the qualification of ST Assembly Test Services Ltd. ("STATS" - NNM: STTS and SGX: ST Assembly), a leading independent semiconductor test and advanced packaging service provider, as a strategic partner for providing turnkey bump sort and flip chip assembly solutions that are optimized for Chartered's advanced technology manufacturing processes. As part of the companies' ongoing collaboration, STATS also joined Chartered's NanoAccessÔ Alliance to target turnkey solutions for Chartered's 90-nanometer (nm) system-on-chip (SoC) manufacturing technologies.
The qualification process initially involved STATS performing its sort and assembly capabilities to deliver a functional 0.13-micron SRAM test chip package, 27 millimeter (mm) by 27mm in size and featuring a silicon die with 1,500 bumps and bump area array of 180-micron pitch.
"Chartered's collaboration with STATS is an important value-added customer service offering that reduces supply-chain complexity and enables companies to achieve their chip functionality and time-to-market objectives," said Kay Chai "KC" Ang, senior vice president of fab operations at Chartered. "We're pleased that STATS has joined our NanoAccess Alliance, and we support their efforts to expand further their back-end turnkey capabilities and specifically target the advanced technology requirements of leading semiconductor companies."
As an inaugural member of Chartered's NanoAccess Alliance, STATS joins the extensive ecosystem of industry-leading library, electronic design automation, intellectual property, and outsourced design and manufacturing services companies. The NanoAccess Alliance brings together critical SoC technologies and services with Chartered's NanoAccess semiconductor manufacturing processes for 90nm and beyond. Chartered and the NanoAccess Alliance companies promote access to open design solutions that allow foundry customers more control over their leading-edge design and manufacturing options. (See September 18, 2003 press release, "Chartered Launches NanoAccess Alliance to Enable Chip Design on
Foundry-Proven 90nm Process Platform")
"Chartered's network-driven model for working with companies such as STATS helps to reduce risk from design conceptualization through to packaged chip. This is especially important for companies contemplating the transition to leading-edge technologies at 90nm and beyond," said Dr. Han Byung Joon, chief technology officer at STATS. "We are excited to be part of Chartered's NanoAccess Alliance and look forward to supporting the needs of our mutual customers."
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 are subject to certain risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ materially. Among the factors that could cause actual results to differ materially are: the difficulties, interruptions or unforeseen delays in the implementation of our collaborative efforts with STATS; changes in market outlook and trends; customer demands; rate of semiconductor market recovery; economic conditions in the United States as well as globally; the performance level of and technology mix in our fabrication facilities 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 and our First Quarter 2003 Quarterly Report on Form 6-K 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.
About STATS
ST Assembly Test Services Ltd. ("STATS" - NNM: STTS and SGX: ST Assembly), is a leading semiconductor test and assembly service provider to fabless companies, integrated device manufacturers and wafer foundries. With its principal operations in Singapore and global operations in the United States, United Kingdom, Japan, China and Taiwan, STATS offers full back-end turnkey solutions to customers worldwide. STATS' expertise is in testing mixed-signal semiconductors, which are extensively used in fast growing communications applications such as data networking, broadband and mobile communications. STATS also offers advanced assembly services and has developed a wide array of traditional and advanced leadframe and laminate based products, including various ball grid array packages to serve some of the world's technological leaders. STATS was listed on the Nasdaq National Market and The Singapore Exchange in January 2000 and is in the Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) Index and the Straits Times Industrial Index. Further information is available at www.stts.com
Certain statements in this press release including statements regarding industry growth are forward-looking statements that involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. Factors that could cause actual results to differ include the interruptions and unforeseen delays in the NanoAccess Alliance program with Chartered; difficulties in implementing turnkey bump sort and flip chip assembly solutions for 90nm applications; general business and economic conditions and the state of the semiconductor industry; demand for end-use applications products such as communications equipment and personal computers; reliance on a small group of principal customers; decisions by customers to discontinue outsourcing of test and assembly services; changes in customer order patterns; rescheduling or canceling of customer orders; changes in product mix; capacity utilization; level of competition; pricing pressures including declines in average selling prices; continued success in technological innovations; delays in acquiring or installing new equipment; shortages in supply of key components; availability of financing; exchange rate fluctuations; litigation and other risks described from time to time in the Company's SEC filings, including its annual report on Form 20-F dated 31 March 2003. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
NanoAccess is a trademark of Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
