United Micro to buy outstanding shares of UMC Japan

TAIPEI, TAIWAN: United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC), the chipmaker based in Taiwan, says it will buy the outstanding shares of UMC Japan (UMCJ) by investing 6.9 billion yen ($76.28 million).

Shih-Wei Sun, CEO of United Microelectronics Corporation, announced at a meet of investors that UMC at present has 50.09 per cent stake in UMCJ.

UMC Japan runs a semiconductor manufacturing plant in Tateyama city in Chiba, Japan, which has a monthly production capacity of 20,000 8-inch equivalent wafers.

In January 1999, United Microelectronics Corporation had bought a majority stake in UMC Japan – which was then known as NMBS Semiconductor – with the aim of making use of UMCJ as its key manufacturing and sales base in Japan.

Shih-Wei Sun said the board of directors of UMC has given the approval to buy the common stocks, the stock acquisition rights and the preemptive rights in UMCJ. The tender for the acquisition is from October 29, 2009, through to December 14, 2009.

It has been proposed to buy 273,603 shares or more, or a majority of the outstanding equity securities of UMCJ that are not yet owned by UMC. At present, UMC holds about 495,650 of all issued shares of UMCJ.

If UMC buys all the shares of UMCJ during the tender offer, the total sum will come to about 6.9 billion yen. In a press release, UMC said the shares of UMCJ will be de-listed as per the criteria for de-listing stock on the Jasdaq Securities Exchange. Eventually, UMCJ will be managed and operated as apart of the UMC Group.