Micron Technology announced plans to invest up to 500 billion yen or $3.7 billion in 1-gamma process technology in Japan, with strong support from the government.
Micron is poised to get about 200 billion yen in financial incentives from Japan to help it make next-generation memory chips in the country, Bloomberg News reported earlier.
This investment aims to drive the next wave of technology innovation, including the emerging field of generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications.
Micron will introduce extreme ultraviolet (EUV) technology to Japan for the production of its next generation of DRAM, known as the 1-gamma (1γ) node. This move positions Micron as the first semiconductor company to bring EUV technology to Japan for manufacturing. Micron’s Hiroshima fab will be playing a crucial role in the development of the 1-gamma node.
The introduction of the 1-gamma node follows the production of Micron’s DRAM node, the 1-beta (1β), at its Hiroshima fab. Micron is making progress in integrating EUV technology and anticipates starting production on the 1-gamma node in Taiwan and Japan from 2025 onwards.
Micron started shipping samples of 1-beta node to mobile manufacturers in November. The company has now commenced shipping its 1-beta-based LPDDR5X memory manufactured in Hiroshima to industrial, automotive, and consumer customers across Asia, the U.S., and Europe.
Micron said this memory offers low power consumption and high performance, catering to applications such as AI, intelligent vehicles, and virtual reality.
Micron has over 4,000 engineers and technicians in Japan. Over the past five years, Micron has hired more than 1,500 new employees in Japan.
Japan Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said he expected additional investment from global chipmakers in Japan after meeting top executives on Thursday ahead of a Group of Seven (G7) summit.
Japan has been striving to reinvigorate its chip sector, whose global market share has fallen to about 10 percent from around 50 percent in the late 1980s, while the United States is increasingly urging its allies to work together to counter China’s chips and advanced technology development, Reuters news report said.