Date: 24/07/2012

ROHM to manufacture FRAM powered chips for Ramtron

FRAM IP owner Ramtron has entered into a Manufacturing and License Partnering Agreement with ROHM Co., Ltd. of Japan. Under the long-term agreement, ROHM will manufacture FRAM-based semiconductor products for Ramtron on ROHM’s established FRAM manufacturing line.

Ramtron to begin selling the first devices produced on ROHM’s manufacturing line within approximately 60 days. Ramtron also has FRAM manufacturing lines at Texas Instruments in Dallas, Texas, and at IBM in Burlington, Vermont.

“ROHM’s advanced manufacturing line, which is production-ready to manufacture commercial F-RAM products, offers Ramtron attractive cost structures and unencumbered product development flexibility,” said Eric Balzer, Ramtron’s CEO. “From a strategic perspective, having ROHM as our partner will further strengthen our competitive position as we continue to expand the addressable market for our products and drive future growth. We look forward to working together with ROHM to capitalize on the significant untapped opportunities for F-RAM based solutions in the semiconductor market.”

“We are eager to combine ROHM’s established production capabilities with Ramtron’s F-RAM brand leadership and product development and marketing expertise to expand the worldwide use of Ramtron’s products,” said Koji Yamamoto, ROHM’s General Manager of Advanced LSI Manufacturing. “We envision a long-term collaboration with Ramtron that will spread the adoption of F-RAM-based products as well as advance the technology to meet the increasing need for high-performance and high data integrity nonvolatile memory solutions in electronic systems.”
Author: Srinivasa Reddy N