Tower Semiconductor Ltd., a pure-play independent specialty foundry, announced that it has won a multi-million dollar per month manufacturing deal for its Fab2 at the 0.13-micron technology generation from a first-tier, US integrated device manufacturer (IDM). Under this deal, technology will be transferred during the coming several quarters after which Tower expects to manufacture between five and eight thousand wafers-per-month, utilizing the new tools it is purchasing from companies such as AMD and Intel, as was previously announced.

The high volume production shipments are expected to commence towards the end of 2008. Following such production, Tower expects that the US IDM could become one of Tower's top three customers.

"We are pleased, and feel it quite an achievement, that an IDM of this size, capability and reputation chose Tower to be it's foundry partner for a critical and projected very large volume family of products," said Tower's CEO, Russell Ellwanger. "We are excited that this product line will utilize our expanded manufacturing capacity in the advanced 0.13-micron technology. We are in advanced stages of closing the deals to acquire the additional tools needed to increase our capacity in Fab2 to a level that will meet this demand."