After originally planning on closing its Tsuruoka Higashi factory this year, Renesas Electronics Corp. and its wholly owned subsidiary of Renesas Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. will transfer the fab to TDK Corp.
Under the terms of the basic agreement, Renesas and TDK are currently negotiating a final deal that will include the handover date and transfer of the personnel currently employed at the Tsuruoka factory. Two years ago, Renesas indicated it would close the factory—a 5-inch front-end wafer fabrication line—and those plans were progressing to be concluded by the end of Renesas’ current fiscal year.
However, TDK approached Renesas in October with a bid to acquire the factory resulting in the basic agreement for the fab.
TDK says the electronic components business based on magnetic materials technology is a core part of its future business. TDK’s three priority markets include the information and communication technologies (ICT) market including smartphones, the automotive market for hybrid and electric vehicles and the industrial equipment and energy market including wind and solar power. TDK wants to expand these businesses and has plans to take its thin-film technology used for magnetic heads for hard disk drives (HDDs) and extend it laterally into electronic components. That’s where the acquisition of this factory comes into place in order to strengthen its core business, TDK says.
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