Hitachi Ltd. and Mitsubishi Electric Corp. said they have decided to bring their semiconductor units together to form a new company called Renesas Technology Corp.
The new company, which should begin operations in April, is intended to combine the system Large Scale Integration (LSI) businesses of both companies, including microcomputer, logic, analog and discrete devices and memory, except DRAM.
The move is in line with continuing consolidation in the semiconductor space. StarCore L.L.C., a marriage of the chip units of Infineon AG., Agere Inc. and Motorola Inc., is perhaps the most prominent of such recent announcements.
“This will create a single, end-to-end operation of development, design and manufacturing to sales and service, allowing system solutions to be provided based on the customer’s point of view,” said the companies.
The proposed chairman of Renesas is Koichi Nagasawa, who is the executive vice president, member of the board group president, semiconductor at Mitsubishi Electric. Satoru Ito, who is the senior corporate officer, president and chief executive officer of semiconductor and integrated circuits at Hitachi, will be president and chief operating officer.
The new company said it will aim to lead in mobile, network, automotive and digital home electronics application fields with its system on a chip solution.
“A stable and firm financial position will be achieved through integration by expanding sales, reducing costs by combining development facilities, sharing manufacturing equipment and purchasing materials in bulk,” said both companies.
Mitsubishi and Hitachi said they think the new company will enjoy advantages in analog, flash memory and discrete devices. Renesas will be the brand name of their products.
