Zhuhai Access Semiconductor, a world leader in coreless organic substrate technology, will build a third plant for 3.5 billion yuan ($542 million) in Fushan Industrial Park, Doumen District to increase annual output value from 2 billion yuan ($310 million) to 8 billion yuan ($1 billion).

This will expand the production capability of high-end radio frequency and flip chip ball grid array (FCBGA) package substrates. Once in mass production by July 2022, Access will produce more than 120,000 pieces of Via Post copper pillar bumped substrate, 20,000 embedded die substrates, and 60,000 FCBGA package substrates every month. Construction of the 260-mu (17-hectare, 43-acre) plant will begin soon.

Access Semiconductor workshop [Photo courtesy WeChat account: meilidoumen]

Substrates connect chips to circuit boards in personal computers and other devices. Composed of thin copper wire sandwiched in resin, they help transmit user instructions to computer chips and relay the answers. The advanced substrate industry provides miniaturization, integration, higher performance, reliability, and efficiency.

The additional plant will also help Access maintain a lead in global shipments of radio frequency and embedded die package substrates. The company is making up for the shortage of Chinese semiconductors in package substrates and boosting Zhuhai's electronic information industry.

Access developed the first IC substrate in a basement after settling in Doumen 15 years ago as a Sino-Israeli joint venture. It is the world's first enterprise to mass produce coreless package substrates with copper pillars.

As a "hidden champion" (small, but highly profitable and mostly unknown), Access began leading the industry in technology and output value in 2017. Access later became China's mass producer of FCBGA package substrates for digital chips. In 2012 the company rebranded itself as Zhuhai Advanced Chip Carriers & Electronic Substrate Solutions Technologies.

Clients include HW, ZTE, Qorvo, Avago Technologies, Texas Instruments, JCET Group, and Tongfu Microelectronics.