Tech: US-based chip gear giant Lam Research’s largest facility to be built in Penang

IF you have ever wondered about the electronic devices we use every day, you may be surprised to learn that Lam Research is involved in nearly all the advanced chips built today.

“Today, each leading-edge device that has any memory or logic chip in it has, at some point, been made using our equipment,” says Lam Manufacturing Malaysia general manager Kuek Soon. The US-based global supplier of innovative wafer fabrication equipment and services to the semiconductor industry was founded in Santa Clara, California, by Chinese-born American technology entrepreneur Dr David K Lam four decades ago.

This is very special year for Lam Research — and by extension, Malaysia — as the chip-gear giant has invested a total of US$225 million (close to RM1 billion) for a new manufacturing facility at Batu Kawan Industrial Park, Penang, as part of its 40th anniversary celebrations. The investment was made via Lam Manufacturing Malaysia.

If everything goes to plan, the soon-to-be-operational 700,000 sq ft advanced technology production plant will become the largest facility within the whole Lam Research group, which already has a strong manufacturing presence in the US, Austria and South Korea.