TSMC Unified DFM Architecture Promises Improved Yields and Accelerated Time-to-Market

- Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Ltd. (TSE: 2330, NYSE: TSM) today unveiled a new Unified Design For Manufacturing (UDFM) architecture that targets 32nm process technology and smaller geometries and improves yields, lowers design costs and accelerates time-to-market and time-to-volume.

The newly-created UDFM provides a unified, encapsulated access to TSMC foundry data and was developed in collaboration with EDA vendors and other design infrastructure partners. The TSMC UDFM is also one of the key collaborative components of the company’s recently unveiled Open Innovation Platform™. Open Innovation Platform™ is a platform for innovations, hosted by TSMC and open to TSMC customers and partners. It is built on TSMC’s design-enabling building blocks and an ecosystem interface.

The TSMC UDFM architecture includes a new DFM Design Kit (DDK) that, for the first time encapsulates, an embedded DFM software engine with an interoperable API in addition to the process-related DFM data and models. UDFM brings an exact copy of TSMC’s factory tool chain and process models into IC design tool chains, providing chip designers with deeper access into more of TSMC’s manufacturing data than ever before. This “copy exact” method compensates for increasing manufacturing variances in advanced process technologies, radically improves design alignment between simulated hotspots and actual manufacturing hotspots, and delivers timely accuracy to the design ecosystem. The new DFM architecture handles very large DFM dataset and design complexity, resulting in reduced design cycle time and faster time-to-market and volume.

“TSMC is laying the groundwork for 32nm process technologies with the industry’s first Unified DFM framework,” said S.T. Juang, senior director of design infrastructure marketing at TSMC. “Through deep and extensive DFM data mining and collaborative development with our design ecosystem partners, TSMC UDFM allows our customers access to accurate manufacturing representation, enabling next generation chip designs to take full advantage of our advanced nanometer process technologies.”

Availability

TSMC’s Unified DFM DDK will be available in early Q3 2008 to registered members through the TSMC customer portal.

TSMC Open Innovation Platform™

Unified DFM is a component of TSMC’s Open Innovation Platform™, that promotes the speedy implementation of innovation among the semiconductor design community, TSMC’s ecosystem partners, and the company’s IP, design implementation, DFM capabilities, process technology, and backend services. A key element of the Open Innovation Platform™ is a set of ecosystem interfaces and collaborative components initiated and supported by TSMC that more efficiently empowers innovation throughout the supply chain and enables the creation and sharing of newly created value. TSMC’s Active Accuracy Assurance (AAA) initiative is a critical part of the Open Innovation Platform™, providing the accuracy and quality required by the ecosystem interfaces and collaborative components.

About TSMC

TSMC is the world’s largest dedicated semiconductor foundry, providing the industry’s leading process technology and the foundry industry’s largest portfolio of process-proven libraries, IP, design tools and reference flows. The Company’s total managed capacity in 2007 exceeded eight million (8-inch equivalent) wafers, including capacity from two advanced 12-inch GigaFabs™ four eight-inch fabs, one six-inch fab, as well as TSMC’s wholly owned subsidiaries, WaferTech and TSMC (Shanghai), and its joint venture fab, SSMC. TSMC is the first foundry to provide 40nm production capabilities. Its corporate headquarters are in Hsinchu, Taiwan. For more information about TSMC please see http://www.tsmc.com.