en.Wedoany.com Reported - Samsung Electronics is expanding the foundation of Korea's domestic system semiconductor (SoC) industry through its foundry ecosystem platform and accelerating the nurturing of promising fabless startups.
On July 1, Samsung Electronics' Foundry Business Division stated that through its advanced collaboration platform "SAFE (Samsung Advanced Foundry Ecosystem)," the company is promoting a virtuous cycle structure with domestic fabless and back-end process partners. This platform covers the entire process from design to shipment.
SAFE is a support project that allows small and medium-sized fabless customers lacking manpower and capital to find all partners within the ecosystem in one stop when they propose an idea, including design asset selection, design tool verification, prototype production, packaging, and testing. The platform is currently subdivided into six specialized alliances that operate organically.
In specific areas, the "IP Alliance" supplies high-quality, reusable design modules for mobile, high-performance computing, artificial intelligence, and automotive chips to shorten fabless development cycles. Since the establishment of Samsung Foundry, the number of IP partners has grown to over 50, with approximately 5,300 intellectual property cores. The "EDA Alliance" verifies whether global design software tools meet Samsung's fine process requirements through its proprietary certification program "SAFE QEDA," reducing the risk of design errors.
The "Cloud Alliance" supports access to Samsung's design toolkit and environment in virtual space, alleviating the infrastructure construction burden for small and medium-sized fabless companies. The "Design Service Alliance (DSA)," established specifically to support companies lacking manpower and experience, includes major domestic design solution partners such as Gaonchips, ADTechnology, and CoAsia, providing close support from design optimization to final drawing handover.
To address the emerging chiplet structure in the recent trend of high-performance chips, the back-end process infrastructure has also been improved. The "MDI (Advanced Packaging) Alliance" optimizes 2.5D and 3D packaging technologies, providing solutions for integrating chips with different functions. The "OSAT (Assembly & Test) Alliance" collaborates with global back-end process specialists to shorten the final product shipment time.
Samsung Electronics operates an independent partner support program on a regular basis to help domestic fabless companies grow. To lower the biggest entry barrier for startup fabless companies—prototype production costs—the company continues to expand the "MPW (Multi-Project Wafer) Shuttle Program," which places designs from multiple companies on the same wafer to share mask costs. Additionally, the company operates the "M.AX Alliance," a strategic collaboration body for securing domestic AI semiconductors that connects demand companies, fabless firms, and foundries.
Samsung Electronics is also aligning with national-level system semiconductor nurturing policies. As a foundry partner, Samsung participates in the K-CHIPS semiconductor tax support plan and the "Challenge for All Fabless" project hosted by the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, providing MPW usage opportunities and up to 200 million KRW in cost support for promising startups established within 10 years.
A Samsung Electronics official stated that if a fabless company develops a product needed by a demand company, Samsung will mass-produce it and supply it to the end customer, allowing all partners in the ecosystem to grow together and form a virtuous cycle structure. To expand the foundation of the domestic system semiconductor industry, the company will further refine and enhance the connection network among players, centered on SAFE.
