JAPANESE printing technologies group Toppan is opening a factory in Singapore to produce high-end semiconductor substrates, which 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 executive vice president Pee Beng Kong, without specifying the value of the investment.

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, he said at the groundbreaking ceremony for the plant on Thursday (Mar 14).

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 targeted 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 (ML).

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

The Singapore factory will feature automation and be more advanced than Toppan’s current factories in Niigata, he added.

AST will also conduct research and development (R&D) on advanced substrate technologies at the facility.

The plant will have a floor area of about 95,000 square metres and is expected to employ over 200 engineers and technicians, along with other operators.

The facility is supported by JTC and EDB, with the latter helping 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.

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