30 SEP 2026 — VisionPower Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, known as VSMC, opened its first chip plant in Tampines on 28 September, 22 months after construction began. Singapore's trade minister called that pace "a record for fab construction in Singapore". The plant is now in trial production. Volume output is due in the first quarter of 2027, and full capacity in 2029.
VSMC is a joint venture between Taiwan's Vanguard International Semiconductor, which holds 60%, and the Dutch chipmaker NXP Semiconductors, which holds 40%. The initial build-out was budgeted at US$7.8 billion when the partners announced it in 2024.
What the plant makes
The fab processes 300-millimetre wafers using older, well-established process technologies, from 130 down to 40 nanometres. The fab does not make leading-edge AI accelerator chips. It makes specialty chips for power management, analogue signals and control, the kind found in cars, factory equipment and phones.
Trade and Industry Minister Tan See Leng drew the same line in his speech at the opening: "Much of the attention today is on the most advanced logic chips that power artificial intelligence. But specialty semiconductors are just as essential."
What changed since 2024
The plan has moved slightly since it was announced. In June 2024, the partners said the fab would serve the automotive, industrial, consumer and mobile markets and create about 1,500 jobs, CNBC reported. The underlying process technology comes from TSMC under licence.
The job estimate is now about 1,600, and the company's release lists interposer applications and the high-performance computing market alongside the original ones.
An interposer is a layer that sits between chips in an advanced package and carries connections between them. It is part of how large AI and data-centre processors are assembled. The release does not say how much of the fab's output will go to that use, and the minister's speech did not mention it.
Yield, and what "opening" means here
VSMC says its first sample batch of wafers came out with yields above 99%, meaning almost all of the chips on those wafers worked. A first sample batch is a small, closely supervised run, so the figure shows the process works, not how the plant will perform at volume.
The opening marks the end of construction and the start of risk production, the stage where a fab makes real chips in limited numbers while customers qualify them. Commercial volume follows in 2027, and the planned 44,000 wafers a month is a 2029 target.
Why Singapore wants it
Singapore already has a strong specialty-chip base. When the venture was announced, CNBC noted that GlobalFoundries and UMC had also expanded their Singapore plants in the preceding years. The minister said the plant would reinforce Singapore's role as "a trusted node in the global semiconductor supply chain".
Jobs and supply
The jobs figure is the local case for the plant. Tan said 75% of the 1,600 roles would be professional, managerial, executive or technician jobs, and that VSMC had signed seven agreements with local polytechnics and universities covering internships, hiring and joint research.
For NXP, the attraction is supply control. VSMC "enhances our geographic resilience, supply control, and cost competitiveness," its chief executive, Rafael Sotomayor, said in the release, adding that NXP's planned capacity at the plant "remains unchanged".
