JAPANESE printing technologies group Toppan is opening a factory in Singapore to produce high-end semiconductor substrates. It will be the first such facility in the Republic.

“This is one of Japan’s largest investments overseas in the past decade, for a key component in the semiconductor supply chain,” said Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB) executive vice-president Pee Beng Kong, without specifying the value of the investment.

Speaking at the groundbreaking ceremony for the plant on Thursday (Mar 14), he said the factory will add to the local semiconductor ecosystem by helping Singapore move into high-growth areas such as artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced data centres.

EDB “remains keen to partner with semiconductor companies globally across the value chain”, he added.

Opened by Toppan’s Singapore-based subsidiary Advanced Substrate Technologies (AST), the factory is to begin production by the end of 2026.

It will produce flip chip ball grid array (FC-BGA) substrates. These are used in high-end semiconductor products such as network switches and chips for AI and machine learning.

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“AST will be our first FC-BGA manufacturing facility outside Japan,” said Tetsuro Ueki, senior managing executive officer and head of Toppan’s electronics division.

The Singapore factory will be equipped with automation technology that is more advanced than that in Toppan’s factories in Niigata, he added.

AST will also conduct research and development on advanced substrate technologies in the facility.

The plant will have a floor area of about 95,000 sq m, and is expected to employ more than 200 engineers and technicians, along with other operators.

The facility is supported by JTC, Singapore’s principal developer and manager of industrial estates, and EDB, which helped to secure resources such as land, electricity and water. It is also supported by Toppan’s largest client for FC-BGA substrates, global tech giant Broadcom, which designs, develops, and supplies semiconductor, enterprise software and security solutions.

Charlie Kawwas, president of Broadcom’s semiconductor solutions group, said: “Advanced technologies developed at AST will be strategically important for us in differentiating our next-generation networking and AI (and machine-learning) products, and sustaining our market leadership.”