2 days ago
- Business
- South China Morning Post
China's leading supplier of 12-inch silicon wafers given greenlight for Shanghai IPO
Eswin, China's largest supplier of 12-inch silicon wafers, has received approval for an initial public offering (IPO) in Shanghai, the latest sign of increased efforts by Chinese chip companies to raise funds amid the rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI) and the country's tech self-sufficiency drive.
The company, which produces monocrystalline silicon polished wafers and epitaxial wafers for the manufacture of integrated circuits, received approval on Thursday for a listing on the Nasdaq-style Star Market, to raise 4.9 billion yuan (US$682.8 million), according to information released by the Shanghai Stock Exchange.
Eswin's capability in supplying 12-inch wafers is seen as an important asset for China's strategic drive towards semiconductor self-sufficiency amid the US-China tech war.
'The era of AI demands greater computing power, faster data transmission, larger data storage, and more responsive human-computer interaction,' the company said in its updated prospectus filed last week.
'To achieve these functional technologies and processes, the most mainstream and advanced logic and memory chips as well as some high-end analogue and sensor chips are manufactured using 12-inch wafers.'
The company said it supplied silicon wafers to 'first-tier wafer foundries' and mainstream memory chipmakers in China, without disclosing the customer names.
Three years after its founding in Beijing in 2016, Eswin secured the expertise of Wang Dongsheng, the founder of BOE Technology, the world's No 1 display maker and supplier to Apple and Huawei Technologies.
