Workforce Development:

TU Delft’s Else Kooi Lab (EKL) for micro-manufacturing has been selected to provide intense hands-on IC technology training to a group of about 100 process engineers of the first IC fab in Vietnam. EKL will give IC Technology courses on location in Vietnam and at the TU Delft, after which a trainee selection will possibly obtain further fab- experience at the production facilities of NXP. The training program starts this fall and will be completed by the end of 2016. Project partners are FabMax, CNS and NXP. The project is supported by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, through the Transition Facility.

Tailor-made training program at EKL

During its history, the Else Kooi Lab (formerly known as the Dimes Technology Center) has acquired the status of preferred training center for many universities and companies world-wide. Students, doctoral candidates and semiconductor professionals ( e.g. process engineers) are offered tailor-made training programs to teach them the basics of IC Technology and develop their practical processing skills. During the course they get ample opportunity to gain hands-on experience in the Class 100 (ISO5) cleanroom, which provides a fully equipped processing environment: from mask making to silicon manipulation to metallization for a wide assortment of structures, devices and complete ICs. The course members perform training processing runs that are fine-tuned to their needs, enabling them to independently run a process that is related to their professional interests.

First IC fab in Vietnam

As part of a national strategy for science and technology, the Vietnamese government has made development of a domestic semiconductor industry a top priority. The first IC fab built is a 200 mm/0.14 micron front-end wafer fab, located at the Saigon Hi-Tech Park in Ho Chi Minh City. Its technology can be utilized for a wide variety of products, including RFID products, SIM cards, Analog ASIC chips, HV ICs, sensor interfaces ICs and power management ICs.

Partners

The Vietnamese semiconductor plant is approved by the Vietnamese government and developed by the Saigon Industry Corporation (CNS), one of the top industrial companies in Vietnam. The Workforce Development program is organized in collaboration with FabMax B.V., a company based in the Netherlands that offers a broad range of support services to the semiconductor industry. NXP Semiconductors is in discussion with CNS about a partnership in starting up the fab.Recognizing the importance of developing a skilled talent pool, partnerships between CNS and with international universities are being strengthened, including TU Delft. The EKL training program for the Vietnamese processing engineers is supported by a grant from the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Netherlands Enterprise Agency).