Toppan Photomasks, Inc., a subsidiary of Tokyo-listed Toppan Printing Co., Ltd., and GLOBALFOUNDRIES (GF), a specialty foundry, today announced that they have entered into a multi-year supply agreement in which Toppan will provide GF with photomasks and related services currently supported by GF’s Burlington, Vermont U.S. photomask manufacturing operation. As a part of the agreement, Toppan will acquire certain assets of GF’s Burlington photomask facility. The agreement will also strengthen the Advanced Mask Technology Center (AMTC) joint venture between Toppan Photomasks, Inc. and GF in Dresden, Germany. This transaction paves the way to transition additional advanced mask manufacturing tools to the AMTC that will increase capacity, thereby further securing its long-term future as Europe’s leading mask manufacturing facility.
Over the next several months, Toppan and GF will work to transition the acquired equipment and processes to Toppan facilities worldwide. These agreements enable Toppan to extend the scale and capability of its Round Rock, Texas facility as well as expand its photomask operations globally and will allow GF to focus resources on its differentiated feature-rich solutions and creating more value for its clients as the world’s leading specialty foundry. There will be no impact to jobs at the GF Burlington facility.
“This agreement builds on our rich heritage of partnership and gives GF access to Toppan’s global capacity while optimizing our Fab 9 floor space for wafer manufacturing growth as we continue our focus on differentiating our platforms,” said Guido Ueberreiter, vice president of global mask and post fab operations at GF. “Toppan is the most suitable partner, by combining our complementary strengths we enhance our competitive advantage to deliver high-quality solutions and services with scale and efficiency to our clients.”
“We are honored to be selected as GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ key photomask supplier for this next step in the company’s transformation and greatly value this opportunity to serve GLOBALFOUNDRIES in a larger capacity,” said Mike Hadsell, CEO of Toppan Photomasks, Inc. “These agreements are a natural extension of our partnership, building on the strong technical and working relationships that have been forged between the two companies through our technical JDP cooperative work and through the AMTC JV in Dresden.”
“We greatly appreciate GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ support in concluding these agreements. The agreements will promote the future development of both companies,” said Tetsuro Ueki, senior managing executive officer of Toppan Printing’s Electronics business. “As the world’s number one photomask maker, we look forward to further contributing to GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ business success.”