Category Archives: Fab 8

Enabling the Next Generation of Packaging Innovation

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Today we announced a significant milestone on the road to enabling 3D stacking of chips for next-generation mobile and consumer applications. At our Fab 8 campus in Saratoga County, NY, we recently began installation of a special set of production tools to create Through-Silicon Vias (TSVs) in semiconductor wafers processed on our leading-edge 20nm technology platform.

In the following video, we sat down with David McCann, senior director of packaging R&D, to get a better sense of the significance of this announcement, as well as GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ overarching strategy to enable next-generation packaging technologies.

Harvard Business School recognizes impact of Fab 8

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A cleanroom at Fab 8.

Last week, Harvard Business School unveiled the results of a comprehensive research initiative called the “U.S. Competitiveness Project,” an effort to understand and improve the competitiveness of the United States.

Once again, New York’s Capital Region was cited as a leading regional center of excellence, with GLOBALFOUNDRIES specifically recognized as one of the leading semiconductor manufactures investing in the new R&D and manufacturing operations now driving innovation, creating new jobs, and increasing economic opportunities throughout the region.

In her article, “Enriching the Ecosystem,” part of the March 2012 special issue of Harvard Business Review dedicated to the topic of U.S. Competitiveness, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Harvard Business School’s Ernest L. Aruckle Professor of Business Administration, specifically references the work GLOBALFOUNDRIES and others are doing in New York’s Capital Region as a concrete example of how to improve U.S. competitiveness, strengthen the U.S. economy, and ultimately help the global economy bounce back.

“Regional centers of excellence…connect basic science to innovation and venture creation. For example, in 2004 the State University of New York at Albany created a College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering, a global first. At the accompanying center of excellence in nanoelectronics—a field essential for the IT industry—engineers from 250 corporate partners can work alongside students and faculty, while SUNY’s business school facilitates spin-off ventures. In September 2011, leading semiconductor manufacturers—including IBM, Intel, Samsung, Taiwan Semiconductor, and GLOBALFOUNDRIES —committed $4.4 billion to develop advanced chip technologies at the center; $3.6 billion of it came from IBM.”

After decades of economic stagnation, it’s exciting to see upstate New York returning as a prominent and prosperous business ecosystem thanks in part to the unique capabilities, investments and involvement of companies like GLOBALFOUNDRIES.

GLOBALFOUNDRIES Puts New York on the Map

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An aerial view of Fab 8.

New York’s “Capital Region” is on a roll. The area, consisting of the State capital city of Albany, the cities of Troy, Schenectady, and neighboring counties like Saratoga County, ranked number four on this year’s Forbes list of the Best Cities for Jobs in the U.S.

Albany, like a lot of the cities on the Forbes list, is a state capital. But the region is also anchored by such economic heavyweights as the CNSE at the University of Albany, the headquarters for GE Global Research and GE’s new $160 million battery plant in Schenectady.

In creating this year’s list, Forbes and Moody’s Analytics, which compiled all the projections for this survey, cited many of these assets as contributing to the region’s economic outlook, and specifically recognized the Fab 8 project as a key engine driving job creation and boosting economic activity in the region.

The Fab 8 project, representing an eventual capital investment of more than $7 billion and consisting of more than 2 million square-feet of development, is creating more than 1,400 new direct jobs in addition to thousands of additional in-direct jobs in the area through the company’s extensive global supply chain.

The massive new project is not only helping to put New York’s Capital Region at the top of this year’s Forbes list, but Fab 8 is also being recognized by Harvard Business School as a strong example of how to improve the competitiveness of the United States – that is, the ability of firms operating in the U.S. to compete successfully in the global economy while supporting high and rising living standards for Americans.

Fab 8 Neighborhood Meeting Next Week

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You are invited to attend our next Fab 8 Quarterly Neighborhood Meeting on Thursday, March 22, 2012 from 6:00-7:00 p.m.  The meeting will take place at the Fab 8 Admin 1 building at 400 Stone Break Road Extension, Malta, NY.  We look forward to seeing you at the meeting.

The meeting will be held at the Admin 1 office building, located at 400 Stone Break Road Extension. To reach the building from Route 9 in Malta, turn on to Stone Break Road and head east into the Luther Forest Technology Campus. Take the second right turn at the roundabout and head up the hill toward Fab 8.

All visitors much check in at the visitor’s desk in the main lobby. As we transition from construction to full operations, parking is limited. Please allow a few extra minutes to find parking. Reserved parking will be available for media and those needing special assistance.  Parking locations are indicated on the site map above.

Fab 8 Neighborhood Meetings are held quarterly as an opportunity for the company to meet with neighbors, provide updates on the company and the project, and answer questions from community stakeholders.

 

Christian Science Monitor Reports on U.S. Manufacturing, Impact of GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ Fab 8

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On Wednesday, Ron Scherer from the Christian Science Monitor published a story about American manufacturing, and how President Obama believes that advanced manufacturing jobs, like those at GLOBALFOUNDRIES, can be the cornerstone of economic revival in the United States.

The information that Scherer shares on GLOBALFOUNDRIES is based on a tour and several interviews that he received while being hosted at Fab 8, in partnership with the Saratoga Economic Development Corporation.

Here’s an excerpt from Scherer’s story:

The new plant, which is about the size of six football fields, has hired 1,100 workers in the past two years and plans on adding another 300 this year. Construction workers are still bustling around the $4 billion facility, which has expanded before it’s even shipped a silicon wafer – and will eventually be a $7 billion operation.

The company is attracting the attention of high-tech companies around the globe. And because the company is more dependent on PhDs than on manual labor, it is an example of where the United States has an advantage over places such as China, where labor costs are so low.

To read Scherer’s full article and see pictures of Fab 8 and GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ New York operations, click here.

IBM and GLOBALFOUNDRIES Begin First Production at Fab 8

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Today GLOBALFOUNDRIES and IBM announced the first products to be developed at the new Fab 8 facility.  The new products recently began initial production at IBM’s 300mm fab in East Fishkill and GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ Fab 8 in Saratoga County, and are planned to ramp to volume production in the second half of 2012. The chips are the first silicon produced at GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ newest and most advanced manufacturing facility and help represent a significant milestone for Fab 8 and New York’s Tech Valley.

The chips are based on IBM’s 32nm, Silicon-on-Insulator (SOI) technology, which was jointly developed with GLOBALFOUNDRIES and other members of IBM’s Process Development Alliance with early research at the University at Albany’s College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering. The technology vastly improves microprocessor performance in multi-core designs and speeds the movement of graphics in gaming, networking, and other image intensive, multi-media applications.

An aerial view of Fab 8

“IBM has helped make New York State one of the world’s premier locations for semiconductor design and manufacturing,” said Michael Cadigan, general manager, IBM Microelectronics. “Recently, we announced that we would spend $3.6 billion researching and developing new silicon technology in New York. We bring the skills, investments and partnerships that keep New York at the forefront of advanced silicon development and manufacturing.”

“Today’s announcement is a natural extension of our longstanding partnership with IBM that includes production of 65nm and 45nm chips at our fabs in Singapore and Germany,” said GLOBALFOUNDRIES CEO Ajit Manocha. “With the addition of our newest factory in New York, we will now be jointly producing chips with IBM at four fabs on three continents.”

GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ new Fab 8 campus, located in the Luther Forest Technology Campus about 100 miles north of the IBM campus in East Fishkill, stands as one of the most technologically advanced wafer fabs in the world and the largest leading-edge semiconductor foundry in the United States. When fully ramped, the total clean-room space will be approximately 300,000 square feet and will be capable of a total output of approximately 60,000 wafers per month. Fab 8 will focus on leading-edge manufacturing at 32/28nm and below.

The companies’ 32/28nm technology uses the same “Gate First” approach to High-k Metal Gate (HKMG) that has reached volume production in GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ Fab 1 in Dresden, Germany. This approach to HKMG offers higher performance with a 10-20% cost saving over HKMG solutions offered by other foundries, while still providing the full entitlement of scaling from the 45/40nm node.

The new chips also will feature IBM’s eDRAM (embedded dynamic random access memory) technology, which dramatically improves on-processor memory performance in about one-third the space with one-fifth the standby power of conventional SRAM (static random access memory). IBM chips are at the heart of the company’s server and storage systems, the world’s fastest supercomputers and many of the best-known and widely used communications and consumer electronics brands.

GLOBALFOUNDRIES Partners with Saratoga County Board of Supervisors to Host Local Career Fair

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GLOBALFOUNDRIES and the Saratoga County Board of Supervisors will co-host a local career fair at the Saratoga County Administration Building on Thursday, January 12, 2012 from 4:00 to 7:00 p.m. ET.

The event is designed to match local candidates with current open positions at Fab 8 and to meet with GLOBALFOUNDRIES team members to understand how to best prepare for future career opportunities within the semiconductor industry.

Fab 8 has created more than 1,000 new jobs in Saratoga County and is expected to create over 400 additional new positions by the end of the year.  The company is recruiting locally to fill open positions in 2012 and for future hiring needs.  Today, approximately 50 percent of the company’s new hires for the Fab 8 project have been hired from New York with about 50 percent being relocated from outside the region and outside the country. As a truly global company, the GLOBALFOUNDRIES workforce in Saratoga County currently represents almost 30 different countries.

Since breaking ground on Fab 8 in 2009, GLOBALFOUNDRIES has been working with local partners, including the State of New York, the New York State Department of Labor, the Center for Economic Growth, and local universities and community colleges, to attract and recruit qualified local candidates to fill the estimated total 1,400 new jobs needed at the new facility. The career fair event on January 12th is the first event to be co-hosted with the Saratoga County Board of Supervisors and is part of the company’s efforts to fill open positions with qualified local candidates.

The Fab 8 facility, which is currently in the process of ramping to full production, is expected to be the most technologically advanced semiconductor manufacturing facility, or wafer fab, in the world and the largest leading-edge semiconductor foundry in the United States.

GLOBALFOUNDRIES-Town of Malta Foundation Awards First Grants to Community Organizations

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On Wednesday, December 21st, the GLOBALFOUNDRIES-Town of Malta Foundation awarded the first wave of funding to support a variety of programs benefiting the local Malta community. The grant awards represent the first money distributed from the new GLOBALFOUNDRIES-Town of Malta Foundation, which was established in 2009 with the start of construction on the GLOBALFOUNDRIES Fab 8 project.

This first set of grants is comprised of $37,500 awarded to thirteen diverse local organizations providing unique and impactful programs. The complete list of grants awarded today includes:

  • Captain Youth & Family Service:  $5,000 towards the purchase of a new van for the Runaway and Homeless Youth Shelter in Malta
  • Dunning Street Rural Cemetery:  $2,500 for maintenance and improvement projects for historic landmark
  • Junior Achievement of Northeastern NY:  $4,600 for materials supporting practical economic education and learning experiences in 46 classrooms in 6 local elementary schools
  • Literacy New York: $3,000 to expand English language instruction & educational programs
  • Living Resources Corp: $3,050 to provide therapy scholarship help to children with multiple disabilities
  • Malta League of Arts:  $2,000 to support creative arts programs and events throughout the community in 2012
  • Malta Ridge Cemetery Association: $2,500 for maintenance and improvement projects for historic landmark
  • Malta Ridge Volunteer Fire Co. & Round Lake Hose Company: $2,500 for smoke detectors, batteries, and educational materials to be installed in local homes that do not currently have properly functioning smoke detectors
  • Malta Seniors, Inc.:  $1,000 to support social and cultural enrichment activities benefiting senior citizens in Malta
  • Malta Sunrise Rotary Club: $2,000 to support the “Rebuilding Together Saratoga” Town of Malta Work Day event providing home and property repairs for families in need
  • Malta Veterans Committee: $1,500 to sponsor the Fourth Annual Malta Military, Veterans & First Responders Parade in 2012
  • Round Lake Auditorium: $4,700 for new sound, lighting, and A/V equipment in improve the Auditorium as an artistic, historic and community forum
  • Rugrunners Robotics Club:  $3,150 to help fund equipment and materials for competitive robotics club at Shenendehowa High School to promote Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics education

Chief Peter Shaw of the Malta Ridge Vol. Fire Co. Inc. said, “The facts are very clear, smoke alarms save lived.  According to the National Fire Protection Association, 30 percent of homes are not adequately protected and 70 percent of home fire deaths in the U.S. occur in homes that don’t have a working smoke detector.  Thanks to the GLOBALFOUNDRIES-Town of Malta Foundation grant, the Safe & Sound Program will have volunteer firefighters providing more than 600 FREE smoke detectors to homes that do not have properly functioning smoke detectors in the town of Malta and Village of Round Lake.”

As part of the development of the Fab 8 project, GLOBALFOUNDRIES is contributing a total of $5 million to fund two charitable foundations – one in the Town of Malta and one in the Town of Stillwater.

The GLOBALFOUNDRIES-Malta Foundation was developed to fund organizations, programs and projects that provide tangible benefits of a public nature to diverse groups located within the Town of Malta including, not-for-profit corporations, charitable organizations, community arts and theater groups, community historical sites, special events, education programs, and sports and recreation activities.

The GLOBALFOUNDRIES-Malta Foundation will continue to receive grant applications and award money earned as income from the initial investment from GLOBALFOUNDRIES.  The Foundation will continue to look for projects that are creative, innovative, and inclusive in their scope and opportunities that will provide the maximum amount of benefit to the local Malta community.

Organizations and individuals seeking funding through the GLOBALFOUNDRIES-Malta Foundation must complete a funding application and return it to:

GLOBALFOUNDRIES-Malta Foundation, P.O. Box 2914, Malta, NY, 12020

The funding application can be downloaded from the Town of Malta’s Web site. Paper copies of the application can also be obtained from the Town of Malta or from GLOBALFOUNDRIES.

GLOBALFOUNDRIES to host quarterly Fab 8 Neighborhood Meeting

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GLOBALFOUNDRIES will host the next quarterly Fab 8 Neighborhood Meeting on Tuesday, December 13th from 6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. Fab 8 Neighborhood Meetings are held quarterly as an opportunity for the company to meet with neighbors, provide updates on the company and the project, and answer questions from community stakeholders.

The meeting is open to anyone in the community. Representatives from GLOBALFOUNDRIES and our construction partners, LeChase and M + W U.S., Inc., will provide updates on the Fab 8 project and answer questions.

The meeting will take place at the Fab 8 construction site in the M+W Group, Inc. Field Office. The address is: 360 Stone Break Road Extension, Malta, NY, 12020.

Parking is available at the M + W U.S., Inc. field office. To reach the lot from Route 9 in Malta, turn on to Stone Break Road and head east into the Luther Forest Technology Campus. Take the second right turn at the roundabout and head up the hill toward the Fab 8 construction site. Follow the signs to the designated parking area, which will be on the right before you reach the construction entrance.

Refreshments will be served. We look forward to seeing you on at the meeting!

 

GLOBALFOUNDRIES Hosts Mixer for Saratoga County Chamber and Southern Saratoga County Chamber

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The Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce and the Chamber of Southern Saratoga County co-hosted a mixer for their members on Thursday, December 8th from 5:30 – 7:30 pm. Over 400 members attended this special event, which was held at Hudson Valley Community College’s TEC-SMART campus in the Luther Forest Tech Campus.

Attendees were able to take a bus tour through the GLOBALFOUNDRIES Fab 8 site to see the newly completed Administration Building as well as see and hear updates from GLOBALFOUNDRIES  representatives about the progress of the construction.  Also, an educational video outlining the manufacturing process of a semiconductor from the beginning stages though the final end product was shown.  Attendees were also able to try on “bunny suits” similar to what’s worn in the clean room and view the “show and tell” products, such as encased wafers.

Tours of the TEC-SMART facility were hosted by HVCC to give a firsthand view on how students in our area are being trained in cutting edge, green technology fields.

As a member of both chambers, GLOBALFOUNDRIES was happy to participate in the mixer and looks forward to partnering with them on future initiatives!