Fujifilm bets on semiconductors to drive India growth; inks pact with Tata Electronics

Japan’s Fujifilm is exploring technology transfer opportunities with Indian companies in the semiconductor space, specifically quality control capabilities, Tetsuya Iwasaki, general manager, electronic materials business division told ET, while underscoring the potential of semiconductor materials as a key growth driver for the group.

Fujifilm Thursday said it is investing about Rs 800 crore to establish a semiconductor materials plant in the Dholera Special Investment Region (DSIR) in phases. It also signed a strategic memorandum of understanding with Tata Electronics to accelerate the development of India’s semiconductor materials ecosystem around the latter’s upcoming fab in Dholera, Gujarat.

“Apart from starting our manufacturing processes, we are also looking at providing technology and manufacturing process knowledge to Indian players in the space as a separate business vertical,” Iwasaki said in an interview at Semicon. “The purity required for semiconductor manufacturing is very high and with material suppliers, the quality level differs, so we are going to look at providing local Indian chemical manufacturers with the technology and quality control capabilities to ensure stable environments and stringent quality standards that are required by the industry.”


He added that Teiichi Goto, chief executive at Fujifilm reaffirmed the company’s belief in developing its semiconductor business in India at a meeting recently with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Iwasaki said Goto believed that semiconductors will be the driving force of Fujifilm’s India growth.

“We consider India not just as a market to get some profit to produce materials but want to build up the production and business capabilities here from scratch,” he said. “We currently have around 10 employees in India but with this investment, that number could go up to 70 in the next five years. We will ramp up. And even now when we have 10 employees currently, there are more than 50 people from the headquarters in Japan supporting this project.”

Iwasaki said the first stage of the project should be completed by 2028 and that the company already has some products certified by Tata Electronics for this phase. The second phase would involve bringing their strength in CMP (chemical mechanical planarization) slurries to India while constantly assessing the needs of other manufacturers in India, some of whom the company is already in active discussions with.

CMP slurries are specialized liquid mixtures containing nano-sized abrasive particles and reactive chemicals used to flatten and polish semiconductor wafers during chip manufacturing.

Developing an R&D centre to service the needs of the projects in India as well as providing crucial skills to local talent is also another aspect that the company is looking into.

“Indian customers have requested us to develop the application level as a first step (setting up a plant),” he said. “The second step would be the R&D centre. It is necessary for our customers to speed up their development, and we have such a setup in Korea, Taiwan, Japan and even in the US. We have the space (at our facility), so a lab and R&D operations are the next step in material development, which will help the overall ecosystem.”