[sdiy] Blimey

Fri Sep 4 18:07:37 CEST 2026

Maybe one of the overseas fabs will pick up the product line.
--Timster

On Fri, Sep 4, 2026 at 5:08 AM Mike Bryant <mbryant at futurehorizons.com>
wrote:

> Just to add one point - a processed 4" wafer costs about $300 to $1000
> before test and packaging.  I suspect their process is near the top end as
> it is quite specialist.  So I expect we're talking about $25k-ish for each
> device you want to do a lifetime buy on.
>
> Hopefully the distributors will do this for some of the more popular
> devices.
>
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Synth-diy <synth-diy-bounces at synth-diy.org> on behalf of Mike
> Bryant <mbryant at futurehorizons.com>
> *Sent:* 04 September 2026 09:53
> *To:* brianw <brianw at audiobanshee.com>; SDIY <synth-diy at synth-diy.org>
> *Subject:* Re: [sdiy] Blimey
>
> In my day job as a semiconductor consultant we see obsolete fabs come up
> for sale all the time.  Over half of them have become supermarkets or
> warehouses.  There's about a thousand times difference in the silicon area
> output of a modern 12 inch fan and an early 1980s 4 inch fab, and another
> ten times in the value per area.
>
> A 4 inch fab cannot make the devices people want - memory and AI chips.
> It cannot even make most of the supporting chips around them which are
> almost all on 8 inch now.  Even power transistors are moving to 12 inch,
> and about three quarters of all discrete transistors in the world, no
> matter what the brand, are made in a single huge 8 inch fab plant in
> Guangdong.
>
> So no government is even going to notice this one closing.  And as the
> press release says, they couldn't keep the fab full with their orders.
> Fabs usually need to be at 85-90% capacity just to break even - the profit
> is in the final 10-15 percent as the basic materials used are dirt cheap -
> it's almost all value add.
>
> It used to be that the equipment from old fabs was bought up by Russia to
> make its military devices, but that door is now closed of course, so the
> only value of this fab is the shell.
>
> Their press release says they will take lifetime orders by end of this
> month, then run them all until they have finished them before then shutting
> the fab.  I expect MOQ (minimum order quantity) will probably be 25 wafers
> worth so about 50,000 devices.  One possibility to reduce upfront cost
> would be to have them process the wafers and deliver them to you in sealed
> containers, then only have them cut, tested and packaged a few at a time.
> There are numerous specialist small companies still doing DIP and other
> obsolete packaging.
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Synth-diy <synth-diy-bounces at synth-diy.org> on behalf of brianw <
> brianw at audiobanshee.com>
> *Sent:* 04 September 2026 04:56
> *To:* SDIY <synth-diy at synth-diy.org>
> *Subject:* Re: [sdiy] Blimey
>
> Thanks for sharing those links, Ben.
>
> I went to THAT Corp's web site looking for the press release, and could
> not find it. However, I did find the following:
>
> "This four-inch wafer fab gives THAT Corporation the only IC production
> facility focused primarily on high-performance audio components. While this
> production fab facility primarily produces THAT’s own proprietary product,
> it is also well suited to service other semiconductor manufacturing needs.
> Foundry customers are invited to design their own chips on our existing
> processes or consult with THAT corporation’s fab engineering team to design
> their own processes. For example THAT’s fab has provided fabricated wafers
> to the “End of Life” semiconductor market where low production volume,
> customized processes are typical. THAT has also provided wafer processing
> services such as thin film deposition or photomasking."
>
> I have not contacted THAT Corp to confirm, but the above seems to imply
> that anyone could fund a run of these chips, so long as they're willing to
> pay the cost. Of course, if they really are shutting down their wafer fab
> entirely, including for custom customer orders, then that would make things
> difficult.
>
> If they're shutting down the wafer fab, then some other company could buy
> it. I imagine it's either not cheap to buy, or at least not cheap to run.
>
> This is strange news, because when tariffs are forcing prices up, in the
> hopes of on-shoring things like chip fab, one business that was born out of
> abandoned wafer fab facilities at a time when chip fab was moving to Asia
> is now giving up on a domestic fab when the powers that be are hoping to
> increase domestic manufacturing. One almost gets the impression that
> economies are more complex than assumed.
>
> Brian
>
>
> On Sep 3, 2026, at 8:27 PM, Ben Bradley wrote:
> > Made me look, found a thread on diyaudio:
> >
> https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/end-of-life-for-several-that-ics.443934/
> > And groupdiy:
> >
> https://groupdiy.com/threads/that-discontinuing-all-their-good-chips.94561
> >
> > A similar thing happened with the "new" TI NE5532. It's actually
> > discontinued, and another lesser chip is being sold with that part
> > number.
> >
> https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/a-new-ne5532-by-december-2025.437381/
> >
> >
> > On Thu, 3 Sept 2026 at 14:55, Neil Johnson via Synth-diy
> > <synth-diy at synth-diy.org> wrote:
> >>
> >> Just heard some very unfortunate news for audio folks..... not sure how
> public it is yet, but ... bloody hell......
> >>
> >> Neil
>
>
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-- 
Timothy Ressel
909-423-5962
FutureRetro Synthesizers
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