COVID-19

Part 1 of 2Read Part 2. While companies navigate the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, corporate leaders should be evaluating a number of key business continuity issues as well as steps they can take to not only react to business disruptions but also reshape their business and recovery plans.We spoke with Dan Steele, Senior Director and the APAC Head of Environmental, Health, Safety, and Security (EHS S) at GLOBALFOUNDRIES (GF) Singapore, via teleconference for insights into the best practices he and his team have implemented from their Business Continuity Plan (BCP) to guide them through the health crisis.SEMI: How did GLOBALFOUNDRIES Singapore first respond when the country reported its first COVID-19 case?Steele: Since the early days of our company, we have had a Business Continuity / Crisis Management (BCCM) team in place that is responsible for business continuity planning for the site. At the beginning of this journey with the coronavirus, we believed in two truths: maintaining the safety and well-being of our employees and consistently communicating precautionary measures the company has taken to protect them and our business. These actions are critical to keeping our employees safe, while keeping the anxiety level low. By informing and updating employees in a timely manner, we ensure that they are well-educated about the crisis as it unfolds and the foreseeable circumstances that could be ahead of us. Once the world was well into the coronavirus outbreak, our CEO declared in a message to all employees that “we entered this pandemic crisis together, and we will exit it together.”We have also established links to pertinent government websites and made them conveniently available to ensure employees have access to the latest available information for their personal lives.SEMI: What actions has GF Singapore taken in response to the crisis so far?Steele: On January 29, our BCCM team activated the first line of defense by initiating temperature checks at all building entrances for every individual including employees, contractors, visitors, and customers who come into our facilities. We asked each to declare their state of health and travel history and issued a temperature card to every employee and resident contractor. They are all required to record their temperature twice daily – once before coming to work and again at midday – and they present the temperature log to security upon their arrival.The following week, our teams split into an A/B work arrangement to ensure continuity of our operations. We proactively pared down our teams to the staff essential for our on-site operations, while enabling the rest to work from home. We also advised our most vulnerable employees with impaired immune systems or who are pregnant to work from home. Concurrently, we moved all meetings of 10 or more people to virtual communications and only allowed meetings with fewer than 10 to be held in rooms with participants sitting at least one meter apart. We informed our customers of our efforts and moved all planned on-site visits to online visits.In line with Singapore’s efforts to curb the spread of COVID-19 within the community, GF restricted site access of people who had recently traveled to countries with sustained community transmission and regularly updated the restriction list. To conduct contact tracing, we created our two degrees of separation list that we used to track employees with families and close associates who were linked to a COVID-19 case. Employees provided the information voluntarily. On our campus, we enforced strict safe distancing measures by limiting access to meeting rooms, marking off-limits tables and removing chairs in the cafeteria, limiting the number of elevator riders to no more than four, and placing boxes or other spacing indicators at smoking zones, bus stops and temperature-taking lines. We also initiated a daily log of employees taking the company buses tagged to the bus number, time, and employee identification numbers in anticipation of the need for contact tracing.Most recently, when the Singapore-Malaysia border closed, we activated the next phase of our BCP that was already in place – housing over 450 Malaysian employees in Singapore hotels.Throughout this crisis, we continuously monitor and evaluate possible impacts to our supply chain to ensure the continuity of our business. This is a standard element of our ongoing business continuity management system.Most importantly, we frequently communicate with our employees and tell them everything the company is doing and why we are doing it. We encouraged employees to monitor their health, stay home if they are unwell, and seek immediate medical treatment if necessary at one of our panel clinics or other medical facilities.SEMI: What are your top concerns amidst this health crisis?Steele: At GF, we are managing through the crisis with an unwavering focus on two guiding principles: the safety and well-being of our worldwide team, their families and communities; and delivering on our commitments to our clients. As the world’s leading specialty foundry, GF has a unique role in the global supply chain. Our semiconductor technology is vital to a range of industries including health care, communications, infrastructure and security. With these priorities in mind, the company undertook unprecedented steps and has adapted to the crisis by dynamically adjusting its protocols, health and safety measures, and business processes to protect its teams while maintaining manufacturing excellence.We are committed to safeguarding the well-being of our employees while supporting and sustaining our on-site operations and protecting customers’ products. A major concern is the impact on our employees. We understand that COVID-19 can be infectious even if an individual is asymptomatic – we are always concerned that temperature screening alone is not sufficient. This is the reason that from day one we have encouraged our employees to monitor their health, follow all government advice for proper hygiene and seek medical attention if unwell as early as possible, and not come to work.Dan Steele has over 25 years of experience in environmental, health and safety, and security operations. He has also held other leadership roles in facilities engineering, quality, reliability and assurance, and risk management.Bee Bee Ng is president of SEMI Southeast Asia.

On April 16, Japan prime minister Shinzo Abe expanded the state of emergency beyond Tokyo, Osaka and five other prefectures to all 47 prefectures nationwide in an effort to curb the spread of COVID-19.As I reported two weeks ago, SEMI Japan initiated communications with all prefectural governments on April 10. Since then, the government’s concerns over the virus’s impact on the semiconductor supply chain have heightened. Prefectural Governments Plan No Restrictions on the Semiconductor Supply ChainOf the 47 prefectural governors I contacted, urging them to classify the semiconductor industry as an essential business, 40 confirmed in follow-up calls through April 20 that they have no plans to restrict operations of the semiconductor industry and supply chain companies in their jurisdictions. Those prefectures include Aichi, Akita, Aomori, Chiba, Ehime, Fukui, Fukuoka, Fukushima, Gifu, Gunma, Hiroshima, Hyogo, Ishikawa, Iwate, Kagawa, Kagoshima, Kanagawa, Kochi, Kumamoto, Kyoto, Miyagi, Miyazaki, Nagano, Nagasaki, Nara, Niigata, Oita, Okayama, Okinawa, Saga, Saitama, Shiga, Shimane, Shizuoka, Tochigi, Tokushima, Toyama, Wakayama, Yamagata and Yamanashi.However, the Aichi, Iwate, Kumamoto, Nagasaki, Oita and Saga governors cautioned they will reconsider restrictions on the semiconductor and other industries if COVID-19 transmissions worsen.The seven other prefectures including Tokyo and Osaka are not planning to respond to our request until they have COVID-19 transmission mitigation plans in place. In the meantime, SEMI Japan will continue to encourage prefectural governments to allow semiconductor supply chain companies to continue to operate unrestricted, a move consistent with current national policy for novel coronavirus disease control.Japan’s Economic Stimulus PackageOn April 6, a day before prime minister Shinzo Abe declared the emergency state for seven prefectures, he announced an unprecedented 108 trillion yen ($989 billion) stimulus package[1]. The package, equivalent to about 20% of the Japan’s economic output, dwarfs the 56 trillion yen in aid passed in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis.The first phase of the relief package seeks to halt job losses and bankruptcies, while the second will support a V-shaped economic recovery. For businesses, phase-one aid includes: Subsidies for firms that keep workers on the payroll. Large companies keeping at least half of their workers on the payroll and small and medium sized businesses that continue to pay at least two-thirds of their employees are eligible for the payouts. One-year deferment of income and regional tax payments for companies hit by the virus Property tax reductions of 50% in fiscal year 2020 for small and medium sized companies with sales that have fallen by at least 30%, and property tax exemptions for those with sales suffering contractions of at least 50%. Interest-free loans requiring no collateral for small and medium sized companies Low-interest loans available to medium sized and large companies through the Development Bank of Japan and Shoko Chukin Bank The second phase of the package, still under development, could include incentives to recharge consumer spending and tourism and subsidies for regional economies once the coronavirus has been contained.Japan COVID-19 Stimulus and Support ResourcesThe economic support measures planned by the Japan Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) are summarized at https://www.meti.go.jp/english/covid-19/index.html#10.Prefectural and municipal stimulus and support information is summarized in Japanese at https://j-net21.smrj.go.jp/support/tsdlje00000085bc.html.SEMI Supports Members with COVID-19 ResourcesSEMI international headquarters and regional offices are here to help you, our members. For more information on our webinars, surveys, best practices and other information designed to help you meet the challenges of the pandemic, please visit the SEMI Coronavirus Updates Resources page.[1] The government increased the stimulus package to ¥117.1 trillion after a sudden policy shift to provide cash handouts of ¥100,000 for every individual in Japan. Originally, the plans were to give ¥300,000 to each household that has seen a sharp fall in income due to the virus outbreak.Jim Hamajima is president of SEMI Japan.

As the world confronts the health crisis of a generation in the form of the fast-spreading coronavirus, the microelectronics industry remains firmly in the spotlight. Aware of the central role they play in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, a growing number of companies are joining efforts to combat the virus by developing technologies for coronavirus detection, contact tracing and predicting its spread.SkyWater Technology, a U.S.-based foundry and prestigious member of SEMI-Fab Owners Alliance, is on the front lines in supplying an essential microfluidic MEMS component used in COVID-19 testing and research to identify mutations of the virus. This component is instrumental for the sequencing kit in the DNBSEQ-T7 system, an ultra-high-throughput sequencing system manufactured by MGI, a subsidiary of global genomics leader BGI Group.SEMI had the pleasure to catch up with Thomas Sonderman, president of SkyWater Technology, to talk about the company’s valuable contribution to the detection of COVID-19. He also gave us a peek into its business continuity plan and the safety measures it is taking to resiliently run a 24/7 chip-making operation amid these unprecedented times.SEMI: Tell us about SkyWater's contribution to the detection of COVID-19 and your partnership with MGI?Sonderman: SkyWater has been working with genomics sequencing leader MGI for several years to supply a critical component used in MGI's DNBSEQ-T7, an ultra-high-throughput sequencing system. The component we supply to MGI is a microfluidic MEMS device that uses microscopic channels to help perform very small-scale chemical reactions in the genetic sequencing platform. MGI's DNBSEQ-T7 identifies and monitors possible mutations of viruses, which is important for epidemiologists when tracking how viral illnesses such as COVID-19 spread through human populations.MGI’s sequencing system is used in parallel with its sister company BGI Genomics’ RT-PCR test kit, which is typically used more broadly as an initial screening agent due to its ability to return virus detection results within a matter of hours. Sequencing with the DNBSEQ-T7 can be used to confirm results of the RT-PCR tests that have indicated positive for the presence of the virus and then to perform a full DNA sequence of these positive specimens, which can help track mutations in the virus.DNBSEQ-T7 is important in the fight against COVID-19 as it tracks how the virus changes and enables scientists to look at its genetic sequence like a fingerprint at a crime scene. Their focus is on finding sudden changes in the sequence over time — a mutation. When they analyze available genomes from infected patients in several countries, they can see if inevitable virus mutations are causing associated illnesses that may have different incubation periods, contagiousness or deadliness – all critical dynamics that must be tracked by public health officials during an outbreak such as this.SEMI: What was the path that brought your company to the forefront of this testing?Sonderman: MGI’s DNBSEQ-T7 sequencing system and BGI’s RT-PCR rapid testing kit were among the first officially approved products by the National Medical Products Administration (NMPA – essentially China’s version of the FDA) – to fight the outbreak. MGI’s manufacturing plant, based in Wuhan, was able to fast-track its response, producing and delivering test kits very quickly to many hospitals and disease control centers in Wuhan and other cities in China.As concerns continue to rise about COVID-19 and we strive to flatten the curve, the pressure is on to enable even faster, more accessible testing. On March 27th, BGI’s RT-PCR virus detection test received FDA Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for use in the U.S. The test works in just three hours. MGI’s DNBSEQ™ T7 sequencers are being used in China and other countries now and will be available in the U.S. starting in Q3. Products from BGI/MGI and affiliates are currently being distributed to more than 70 countries and regions worldwide to assist the global efforts in fighting the pandemic.SkyWater is certified to the ISO 13485 Quality Standard for Medical Devices to support the design, development and fabrication of DNA sequencing and other biochip applications in a wide range of emerging biomedical market segments. This allows us to provide this type of cutting-edge technology solution that is making an important contribution to coronavirus detection.SEMI: Given the challenges COVID-19 has placed on workforce and supply chain, what steps are being taken by your company to mitigate disruptions? Sonderman: SkyWater has been identified as Essential Critical Infrastructure per the U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security in several categories including Healthcare/Public Health Sector, Defense Industrial Base Sector, Information Technology Sector, and Critical Manufacturing Sector. To maintain continuity of operations, we contacted our close market partners as we need their support to continue supply of their starting and manufacturing support materials necessary for us to maintain operations. We asked these organizations to make every reasonable effort to fulfill our order requirements while also following recommended protective measures and are actively monitoring these relationships for possible developments that could be disruptive. By means of their partnership with us, these suppliers, too, are a part of the Essential Critical Infrastructure. Currently, there has been no change in wafer operations or fab utilization during this time of COVID-19.In addition to our sustained operations, our fab expansion is well underway as construction continues. The over 60,000-square-foot facility expansion adds clean room area and infrastructure to support the Department of Defense’s investment in SkyWater to broaden our production capabilities for Strategic Rad-Hard electronics and other complementary technologies. A fab technician in SkyWater’s SkyTech Center, an expansion of its operations to enhance advanced processing capabilities at its U.S.-based and U.S.-owned manufacturing facility. SEMI: What advice would you give to other companies seeking to keep their operations running amid COVID-19?Sonderman: First and foremost, creating a Pandemic Response Team (PRT) was critical for us in planning how to operate and communicate during this crisis. Our PRT updates our leadership team multiple times per week to enact procedures and ensure alignment throughout the organization. We follow CDC alerts and other local, state, and federal government guidelines on how to deal with home and work environments while communicating with all company stakeholders. This is important in providing reassurance of the company’s continued business and details on any potential change in operations.Increasing the frequency of communication with the organization’s supply chain to anticipate any disruptions in service is vital. Also, keeping in contact with customers is imperative to take the pulse of their continued operations during COVID-19. We recommend being flexible and pursuing new paradigms in getting business accomplished, such as telecommuting. In addition, if a company is deemed an essential business, we suggest drafting a letter in advance for employees should they need to prove why they are in transit (to and from work) if transportation becomes severely limited and monitored.Communicating with employees on how operations are changing is crucial. Ensure there is an intranet site that employees can access remotely via laptops or mobile devices that allows for ongoing updates and a way to communicate to all employees as things continue to evolve.We also put several safety measures in place, including: A screening process was set up to take the temperature of everyone entering the building. Site access is restricted for vendors, contractors, customers and other visitors as a default policy. Employee travel is restricted. All employees who can do their jobs from home can stay home. For essential on-site workers, we allow flexible schedules so people can move shifts if needed. Shifts have been staggered so people are not congested at lockers, gowning areas and other places. Physical distancing is required everywhere inside and outside the building. Video conferencing is being used even for participants inside the building. The number of people allowed in conference rooms is limited to comply with physical distancing; some chairs were removed and maximum occupancy signs were posted. Hand-sanitizing stations have been set up. We are providing employees access to masks, gloves and cleaning wipes. Safety measures are posted around the building and cleaning frequency of hard surfaces has been ramped significantly. These safety measures are among several other modifications we’ve made to daily operating procedures. SEMI: Please share some examples of how the SEMI Fab Owners Alliance (FOA) has helped support your business?Sonderman: Our Pandemic Response Team has leveraged the FOA recently by participating in its webinars on COVID-19 to ensure we are using industry best practices. We also use FOA surveys to provide and request information pertaining to COVID-19 practices.We have implemented building entrance protocols (i.e. temperature scanning, restricting access for non-employees) and expanded building cleaning procedures, including increasing the cleaning frequency of specific high-touch items. We have adjusted shift start times to minimize the number of personnel in the change room at the same time and we store each fab worker’s hood in the sleeve of the suit. These last two items resulted from a conversation with another FOA member.Outside of the pandemic, we have leveraged the FOA by participating in its industry-wide maintenance best practices and learning group that meets monthly on maintenance needs, issues and concerns within the industry. This allows us to learn from each other within the semiconductor industry. We have also leveraged this group in sourcing parts and/or parts sharing on tools no longer supported by OEMs.We greatly value the type of cross-organizational sharing and learning the FOA facilitates. It has been beneficial in a number of ways over the years. At this time, the FOA is especially useful when best practices are crucial to enable us and our peers to minimize disruptions, operate with the utmost safety, and quickly adapt to this new environment.SkyWater is a member of the SEMI Fab Owners Alliance, an international group of semiconductor and MEMS fab managers and industry suppliers that meets regularly to solve common non-competitive manufacturing issues and improve their business results. Nishita Rao is a product marketing manager at SEMI.

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak earlier this year, the world has been flocking online – to connect, to share stories, and, for those who can, to continue to work to help keep the wheels of economies turning. With its shift away from in-person events, the SEMI Foundation, too, has found new ways to connect with members and talent. We have started to develop online content for high-school and university students to maintain engagement with these vital pools of future talent. As we build our online presence, we will also explore providing support for reskilling employees, veterans and other target hire groups to help meet microelectronics industry’s talent needs.This strategic shift involves repurposing and transforming existing programs. One key focus area as we evolve our work has been SEMI High Tech U (HTU), a hands-on industry exposure program the SEMI Foundation launched in 2001. The program aims to gather high-school students at member company work sites to learn about the science behind semiconductor technology and various career paths. We are working to offer this career education opportunity online to better connect with students and educators all over the world, regardless of their proximity to a member company. This new guided online journey through the manufacture of a silicon chip will allow users to learn about the science, technology, equipment and companies needed to create this amazing device that is the heart of our digital world.The SEMI Foundation’s open houses catering to university students are also going online. The virtual events will give students a chance to learn about the critical technologies emerging from the microelectronics industry and available career opportunities. They will also be able to submit their resumes for open positions at our member companies.We’re excited as we gear up to launch these online programs in order to expand our reach and impact and to support the critical workforce development needs of our member companies. As we begin to expand our online content, we will be recording our educational webinars and gathering testimonials from corporate leaders and offering both as free resource to members, students and potential hires. These digital resources will help our members share talent development best practices and give students deeper insights into the industry.If you would like to support these initiatives as the SEMI Foundation continues to help the industry attract, develop and retain talent in ways that no single member company can alone, you may do so in a number of ways: Volunteer to review educational content for accuracy and relevance Sign up to be a speaker or panelist at upcoming virtual events Share industry informational videos Highlight industry technologies that are making a difference in the world Showcase how your company is addressing STEM education and workforce development Sponsor an upcoming SEMI Foundation workforce development event To get involved, please contact Shari Liss, executive director of the SEMI Foundation, at [email protected].

Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe declared a state of emergency for Tokyo, Osaka and five other prefectures[1] on April 7 in response to a startling increase of COVID-19 infections in the region’s cities in an uneasy moment for its domestic semiconductor industry. The declaration, effective through May 6, authorized the six prefectural governors to strengthen curbs on the spread of the virus and included guidance for citizens to stay home and restrictions on operations of non-essential businesses.With Japan supplying some 40 percent of the world’s chip production equipment and materials, the declaration stirred fears among semiconductor manufacturers that their uninterrupted operations – critical to sustaining the global industry – might be at risk. Japan Government Designates Semiconductor Industry as EssentialIn April 7 and 11 revisions to its Basic Policies for Novel Coronavirus Disease Control, the Japanese government allayed those concerns by designating semiconductor manufacturers essential businesses – a stark acknowledgment of the chipmakers’ vital role in combatting the novel coronavirus. The policy stated:“Among medical and manufacturing industries, we request the continuation of the following business operators in consideration of infection prevention: operators who are difficult to stop production line due to the characteristics of the equipment (such as blast furnaces and semiconductor factories); and operators who produce essentials (including important items in supply chains) for protection of the people who need medical care and support, as well as for maintenance of social infrastructure. We also request the continuation of the business operators who sustain medical care, the lives of the people, and maintenance of the national economy.”[2]SEMI Japan Reaches Out to Prefectures to Urge Essential Business Designation Equipment and materials shortages can halt production of an entire fab line and ripple through intricately connected global supply chains to stifle the production of end devices including the electronics critical to COVID-19 treatments. Electronic devices also play a central role in containing the virus’s spread by enabling artificial intelligence (AI), data analytics, digital communications, telemedicine, robotics, remote health monitoring, telecommuting, online shopping and other digital services.The essential business designation was explicit recognition that Japan’s semiconductor supply chain is integral to the global chip production ecosystem and worthy of the same protections the government has implemented for semiconductor companies. With SEMI members operating in Japan’s 47 prefectures, I sent letters to all prefectural governors three days after the second policy revision, urging them to apply the same designation, and the SEMI Japan team is following up to secure their support.SEMI Japan Encourages Government to Exempt Members from Travel Restrictions The Japan Foreign Ministry on March 31 raised to level 3 its travel advisory for 49 regions including the U.S., China, Taiwan and South Korea, encouraging Japanese citizens to avoid travel regardless of purpose to blunt the international spread of the coronavirus. SEMI Japan is working with the Semiconductor Equipment Association of Japan to urge the government to exempt semiconductor supply chain companies from the level 3 travel restrictions if they implement measures to prevent domestic infections and contagion in the visited regions. The exemptions would allow supply chain companies to install and service equipment at fabs – one key to maintaining smooth, uninterrupted operations.SEMI Supports Members with COVID-19 ResourcesSEMI international headquarters and regional offices are here to help you, our members. For more information on our webinars, surveys, best practices and other information designed to help you meet the challenges of the pandemic, please visit the SEMI Coronavirus Updates Resources page.[1] The six prefectures are Tokyo, Kanagawa, Chiba, Saitama, Osaka, Hyogo and Fukuoka.[2] Provisional translation by Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare. Full document is available at https://www.mhlw.go.jp/content/10900000/000620733.pdf.Jim Hamajima is president of SEMI Japan.

The microelectronics industry entered 2020 with high hopes after a mixed 2019 that saw global semiconductor revenue fall 11 percent while innovators continued to drive impressive advances in 5G, IoT, artificial intelligence, quantum computing and other leading-edge technologies. Equipment sales were rebounding as the industry started to regain momentum. And then COVID-19 sent disruptions rippling throughout the global supply chain. Semiconductor manufacturing facilities scaled back operations. Parts shortages became a problem. Logistical challenges emerged. And, all the while, many workers retreated to their homes under lockdown.The virus forced the industry, en masse, to pivot like never before to ride out the pandemic. This is the most challenging situation that I have experienced in my nearly 40-year career. All of us in the microelectronics industry have dedicated ourselves to rise to the occasion and help others. Among our efforts, we are providing resources to support SEMI members and the industry. Today, we can take heart that manufacturing firms in China are restoring normal operations. SEMI hosted a webinar on March 26 where our colleagues at McKinsey Company shared insights on China as it begins its recovery as well as the broader impact of the pandemic on the microelectronics manufacturing and design supply chain. You can read about McKinsey’s insights in a recent SEMI blog.In my closing remarks at last month’s webinar, I asked the industry to donate masks, gloves and additional personal protective equipment (PPE) to support our overwhelmed healthcare systems. The battle against the virus rages on around the globe. These donations will help people, businesses and whole economies to heal and recover.I am proud of how generously the microelectronics industry has donated these supplies that, in ordinary times, contribute to the meticulously controlled environments of our industry’s manufacturing facilities, but today can help save lives and bring the pandemic to heel. I ask companies across the supply chain to please explore how you can contribute to this effort. Donation information is available on our Coronavirus Resources webpage under Medical Needs Supply Matching Sites. It’s great to see SEMI members help combat COVID-19, and we are highlighting some of their efforts in news stories and blogs on our Coronavirus News and Blog webpage. We encourage you to submit your story.We know our members are hungry for more COVID-19 insights to help guide their way as uncertainty persists. SEMI is offering a follow-up webinar with McKinsey Company – The Way Forward from COVID-19 – on Thursday, April 23rd from 7:30am to 8:45am Pacific Time. Then, on Thursday, April 30th from 8:30am to 10:30am Pacific Time, the SEMI Americas team will host the virtual forum Semiconductor Outlook—Navigating through Turbulent Times. Bank of America Merrill Lynch will provide an update on semiconductor stocks, IHS Markit a market outlook, and VLSI Research the latest on COVID-19’s impact on the semiconductor industry. The goal of these events is to help you, our members, make more informed business decisions. We look forward to your participation and ask that you please submit questions so that the events are more meaningful for you.We have also added more resources to our SEMI Responds webpage, which lists best practices for company policies, public communications and telecommuting from our Environment, Health and Safety (EHS) and Information Technology Leadership (ITL) groups. The page now includes member survey insights from our Fab Owners Alliance (FOA) and Electronic Materials Group (EMG) on COVID-19 impacts to those communities, along with steps members are taking to maintain business continuity and ensure that their facilities remain safe. A big thanks to members of these groups for participating and sharing learnings with the industry at large. Sustaining operations across the industry has been the focus of work by the SEMI Global Advocacy team the past few weeks. It has continued to lobby for the microelectronics industry to be classified as an essential business in the United States and for similar designations in other countries. Those efforts included a SEMI Americas request for the government of Mexico to designate the semiconductor manufacturing supply chain an essential business, consistent with U.S. guidelines, to help avoid disruptions to the North American semiconductor industry. SEMI Europe sent 22 letters to officials across the continent, three of them to the European Commission, urging governments to allow continuous operations of the semiconductor industry. SEMI Japan has been closely engaged with the central government and sent letters to many Japanese prefectures stressing the critical importance of continuing operations.I am truly proud of how the SEMI team has stepped up around the globe to proactively communicate and support our members with relevant information and best practices related to the pandemic. The outcome of our letters to governments around the globe to seek essential business status has generally been very positive.SEMI also continues to oppose unilateral U.S. export controls that will compromise the ability of the U.S. to export semiconductor manufacturing equipment and materials, as highlighted in a recent Reuters article.SEMI advocacy efforts epitomize our overarching approach to the pandemic: We remain squarely focused on supporting our members during these turbulent times while continuing to lay the groundwork for the industry’s prosperity. Ajit Manocha is President and CEO of SEMI.

In the past 3 months, silicon wafer shipments leveled off and the YoY growth rate had started to rebound, SEMI reported in Silicon Wafer Market Monitor, a new quarterly report that tracks wafer shipment dynamics including historical shipments, supply & demand shifts, and pricing trends & forecasts.

For five days in the latter half of March, the pall of the heavy human and economic toll COVID-19 has exacted in China appeared to be lifting. The epicenter of Wuhan reported no new coronavirus infections through domestic transmission. And in an initial step to loosen its nationwide lockdown, China began reversing restrictions on travel within its borders.Now, in another sign of progress, the region’s idled factory workforce is preparing to return to the production lines. Outside of Hubei province, home to Wuhan, most manufacturing workers are expected to be back on the job by the end of this month, with the proportion of manufacturing employees returning to work in Hubei cities except Wuhan reaching 70 percent by then, said Didier Chenneveau, Partner, Supply Chain Practice, McKinsey Company, in a late-March webinar presented by the business consultancy and SEMI.McKinsey is also “seeing evidence of a rebound in demand led by China’s online sales” as rising consumer confidence and a surge in the popularity of work-from-home policies spur strong spending on laptop computers, Chenneveau said.The turnaround stands in stark contrast to the unprecedented drop in demand McKinsey saw across retail and durable goods in China early in the year. Over the first two months, passenger car sales plunged 90 percent, smart phone receipts 40 percent and retail sales 21 percent, leading to what Chenneveau calls a whiplash effect that could disrupt supply chains as manufacturers and shipping companies scramble to meet pent-up demand once a recovery takes hold. As the outlook for China’s factories and suppliers brightens, concerns are shifting to the ripple effect of its deep manufacturing pullback on demand for goods in the United States and Europe. Sharp disruptions to global supply chains caused by labor shortages and knotty logistics challenges have also become worrisome. And while China is buoyed by the prospect of normalizing its workforce and manufacturing capabilities, parts shortages are bottlenecking production. In the United States and Europe, where 60 percent of air freight is carried in cargo holds of passenger aircraft, logistics concerns loom large with the widespread flight groundings. “Logistics must be a priority in any crisis war room because it’s a big challenge,” Chenneveau said.Asia Semiconductor Supply Chain ImpactsIn Asia, the semiconductor supply chain is working to overcome intractable challenges caused by COVID-19 including sourcing raw materials for chip manufacturing and maintaining assembly and test operations, Mark Patel, Sr. Partner Semiconductor Practice Lead, McKinsey Company, said at the webinar. Those problems cascade to foundries and IDMs even as they confront the compounding issue of a shortage of fab operators and engineers. Downstream, the inability to package, test and qualify products risks exacerbating the supply constraints.Patel said another acute challenge is that most semiconductor manufacturers and suppliers are operating under restricted practices, making it harder to sustain engineering activities vital to new product introductions, new process development and capital equipment expansion. In the longer term, the supply chain fallout hold implications for product life cycles and investments in capacity and next-generation technology – factors that analysts will need to monitor in evaluating the economic impact.Returning Workers Key to Economic RecoveryIssuing shelter-in-place orders have been an effective antidote to the spread of COVID-19 but a double-edged sword as nations worldwide sustain the economic blowback. Discretionary consumer spending on items such as automobiles has dropped by 45 percent globally so far this year, business investment has fallen and trade has seen a sharp slowdown, said Sven Smit, Chairman and Director at the McKinsey Global Institute, speaking at the webinar.A lockdown for as little as a month can slash aggregate global GDP by as much as 10 percent, a scenario McKinsey expects to play out in the second quarter of 2020. The drop would be the deepest since World War II and larger than the plunge in the first quarter of the Great Depression, raising the question of how long governments can afford to keep workers holed up at home.“The economic shock is unprecedented,” Smit said. “We’ve never sent people home to not work. Even in World War II, next to the front lines, people were harvesting food.”China offers a potential blueprint for economic recovery. McKinsey estimates that China’s rigorous containment efforts could help its economy bounce back in as little as six months – a V-shaped rebound. Western nations generally have not been as forceful with their containment measures. For them, the fight against the pathogen could be prolonged, deepening the economic damage.Yet even with the best protective lockdowns, a new challenge arises: The longer shelter-in-place orders remain in effect to contain the spread of the virus, the longer the economic impact drags on. “Until the path to return to work becomes clearer, people will not be confident to spend,” Smit said.Confronted with that reality, governments worldwide must strike the delicate balance between safeguarding the lives of people – critical forces of economic growth through consumer spending – and limiting the economic shock. The faster the virus can be brought to heel, the softer the impact to economies around the world. And the stronger the return-to-work protocols in place once COVID-19 has been brought under control, the faster workers can get back to their jobs. Smit believes resolving both issues simultaneously is not only possible but necessary for a return to normalcy.“That’s the imperative of our time,” he said. Related blog COVID-19: The Way Forward – Insights from McKinsey Company For McKinsey’s latest insights on the coronavirus pandemic, visit its website, which is updated daily.For the latest COVID-19 information and SEMI event updates SEMI is providing members, visit Coronavirus Resources.Michael Hall is a marketing communications manager at SEMI.

On Saturday, March, 21, 2020 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gave emergency authorization to Cepheid, a California company, to sell a new test for rapid detection of the pandemic coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19. Cepheid’s Xpert® Xpress SARS-CoV-2 test gives healthcare workers results in just 45 minutes, with less than a minute of hands-on time for sample preparation.Cepheid, founded by Kurt Petersen, M. Allen Northrup and five others in 1996, is well known in the MEMS community for commercializing microfluidic chip-based polymerase chain reaction (PCR) analysis machines. This is not the first time Cepheid has responded quickly to a biological threat; after the 2001 terrorist attacks in the USA, Cepheid was the first to provide rapid anthrax detection capabilities to the U.S. Postal Service, and it still does today.At the heart of all COVID-19 test protocols (see the WHO protocol and U.S. CDC protocol) is the real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) analysis technique. In a very simplified description, PCR uses thermal cycling to amplify the DNA present in a patient’s swab sample, and then using fluorescence optical detection, searches for the virus’s specific DNA. The test requires knowing the virus’s genome in the first place; the crucial work to sequence the full genome of SARS-CoV-2 was first published by Chinese scientists for public use on January 10, 2020.While traditional PCR machines take many hours to thermal cycle and reach a result, MEMS-based PCR systems can work much faster. Featuring scale heaters and reaction chambers that have a tiny thermal mass, they create a significantly faster heat-cool cycle, enabling a rapid result in minutes.The first MEMS silicon PCR chip, developed by Northrup et. al. at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and licensed to Cepheid (left) and the Cepheid test cartridge today (right). (Source: Northrup MA, Ching MT, White RM, Watson RT, “DNA amplification in a microfabricated reaction chamber,” Transducers 1993, Yokohama, Japan. pp. 924–926.) Research on MEMS-based PCR systems has continued steadily since the early 1990s. Today, researchers have been focusing on developing highly integrated, low-cost systems specifically for point-of-care use. One example of recent research: a team at Korea’s ETRI and Genesystem have developed a prototype low-cost, handheld PCR system having a polyimide chamber and microheater and an integrated CMOS detector for optical readout of results (figure below). Cross-section schematic of the chamber, heating module and integrated optical detector in a portable PCR prototype (left) and integrated test cartridge (right). (Source: DS Lee, OR Choi, and YJ Seo, “A Handheld and Battery-Powered Realtime Microfluidic PCR Amplification Device,” Transducers 2019, Berlin, Germany pp. 1063-1065.) Korea’s quick recruitment of its biotech companies and creation of novel drive-through testing sites helped it to successfully pinpoint its COVID-19 outbreak and to implement control measures. Let’s hope the Cepheid test can be similarly effective.Based on successive epidemics of SARS, MERS and now COVID-19, rapid PCR test machines, enabled by MEMS technology, are becoming essential medical tools in the fight against viral outbreaks. As continued development lowers the cost of such critical equipment, let’s hope we may soon have a PCR machine in every doctor’s office.Alissa M. Fitzgerald, Ph.D., founded A.M. Fitzgerald Associates, LLC (“AMFitzgerald”), a MEMS and sensors solutions company based in Burlingame, CA, in 2003. She has over 25 years of engineering experience in MEMS design, fabrication and product development.Prior to founding AMFitzgerald, Fitzgerald worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Orbital Sciences Corporation, Sigpro, and Sensant Corporation, now part of Siemens. She received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from MIT and her doctorate from Stanford University, in Aeronautics and Astronautics. Fitzgerald has numerous journal publications and holds eight patents. She served on the Governing Council of MEMS Industry Group from 2008-2014 and was inducted into the MIG Hall of Fame in 2013. Fitzgerald serves on the Board of Directors of both Rigetti Computing and the Transducer Research Foundation.AMFitzgerald is a longtime member of MEMS Sensors Industry Group (MSIG), a SEMI Strategic Association Partner. For more information on AMFitzgerald, please visit: https://www.amfitzgerald.com.Interested in learning more about this topic? Read Alissa M. Fitzgerald and Farzad Khademolhosseini’s article in EE Times, MEMS in the Fight Against Covid-19.

SEMI has urged government representatives around the U.S. and world to designate the semiconductor industry as an essential business so operations at companies across the chip supply chain can continue without interruption as the spread of COVID-19 continues. SEMI President and CEO Ajit Manocha assured the U.S. and global officials that SEMI members – the device makers and suppliers of chemicals, materials, components, design tools and equipment at the heart of chip manufacturing – “are employing all measures necessary to maintain the health and safety of their employees and local communities” to help contain the virus. Manocha last week sent letters to the governors of 16 states and the chairs of the National Governors Association, U.S. Conference of Mayors, National League of Cities, and National Association of Counties requesting consideration of the semiconductor industry as an essential business if shelter-in-place or similar orders are issued to curb the spread of COVID-19. More than half of U.S. states have imposed shelter-in-place or stay-at-home orders in the past month. The designation would allow SEMI members to maintain continuous operations to ensure that manufacturing of components for critical infrastructure equipment, the defense industrial base, and other vital technological products and services is not jeopardized. Semiconductors are the foundation of modern electronics and information technology and are critical in helping health workers effectively treat COVID-19 symptoms, Manocha told the officials. The devices also play a central role in containing its spread by enabling artificial intelligence (AI), data analytics, digital communications, telemedicine, robotics, remote health monitoring, telecommuting, online shopping and other digital services.Manocha urged state and local officials to follow guidelines issued on March 19 by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) identifying “manufacturers and supply chain vendors that provide hardware and software, and information technology equipment (to include microelectronics and semiconductors) for critical infrastructure as ‘essential critical infrastructure workers.’” Most states issuing shelter-in-place or stay-at-home orders have followed the DHS guidelines and/or separately designated the semiconductor industry an essential business. Likewise, other nations have recognized the power of technology in effectively containing COVID-19 and similarly designated the semiconductor industry an essential business.On March 27, SEMI, the Semiconductor Industry Associations in China, Europe, Japan, Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and the U.S., as well as several other trade associations in Asia issued a statement “calling on all governments to specify semiconductor industry operations as ‘essential infrastructure’ and/or ‘essential business’ to allow continuity in operations.” The global semiconductor supply chain forms a highly intricate network consisting of research, design and manufacturing operations. Operating restrictions in one region can compromise production in others, leading to inefficiencies and breakdowns that cascade across the supply chain.With semiconductors underpinning vital sectors of the global economy, the chip associations called on all global governments at all levels – central, states, provinces and localities – to help protect the uninterrupted operations of domestic semiconductor companies and their suppliers by applying the essential infrastructure or essential business designation.Joe Pasetti is Vice President of Global Public Policy and Advocacy at SEMI.