On February 18, Singapore Prime Minister and Finance Minister Lawrence Wong delivered the 2025 budget and policy direction in Parliament, and promised to increase investment in areas such as chips, energy and aviation.
According to the budget, Singapore plans to allocate S$1 billion (about US$745 million) to set up a new semiconductor R&D center to promote innovation. Lawrence Wong said that Singapore accounts for more than 10% of the global semiconductor market share and more than 20% of equipment, and it is necessary to further enhance the existing competitive advantage areas.
Data shows that Singapore's semiconductor industry started in the 1960s and has been further developed in recent years. It has built a semiconductor industry system covering the entire industry chain including chip design, manufacturing, packaging and testing, equipment, materials, etc. According to data from the Singapore Semiconductor Industry Association, Singapore has more than 30 integrated circuit design centers, nearly 20 wafer fabs, and more than 10 assembly and testing companies.
At present, Singapore has attracted a large number of semiconductor giants to invest in building factories or setting up R&D centers, including Applied Materials, Advanced Semiconductor, NXP, Micron, TSMC, Infineon, GlobalFoundries, UMC Siltronic, Soitec, etc. Among them, Applied Materials plans to set up the EPIC Advanced Packaging cooperation platform in Singapore to promote innovation in new chip architecture, materials and processes. It is reported that manufacturers planning to cooperate through this platform include AMD, TSMC, Samsung and Intel.
Micron's $7 billion high-bandwidth memory (HBM) advanced packaging plant in Singapore officially started construction on January 8, 2025. It is reported that the plant is scheduled to start operations in 2026 and expand Micron's total advanced packaging capacity from 2027 to meet the growing demand for artificial intelligence.
The 12-inch wafer fab jointly built by World Advanced and NXP in Singapore started construction on December 4, 2024. The total investment in the fab is US$7.8 billion. It is expected to go into mass production in 2027 and reach a monthly production capacity of 55,000 wafers in 2029. It is estimated that about 1,500 jobs will be created. It is reported that after the first 12-inch fab goes into mass production, World Advanced and NXP will evaluate the construction of a second fab.