(Yicai Global) Feb. 9 -- China Resources Microelectronics will invest CNY22 billion (USD3.2 billion) to construct a 12-inch integrated circuit wafer factory in Shenzhen to supply the automotive electronics, new energy and consumer electronics sectors.

The factory will use 40-nanometer-and-above process technology and will produce 40,000 chips a month, CR Microelectronics said yesterday. It will make the firm’s main products and put the company’s strengths into play along the whole industrial chain from semiconductor design to packaging and testing, it added.

Invitations to bid for the engineering, procurement and construction contract as well as the procurement of key devices will be sent out in the first quarter this year, the Wuxi, eastern Jiangsu province-based company said.

Construction is expected to begin in the second quarter and to be completed by the third quarter next year, said CR Microelectronics, which is a unit of state-owned China Resources Holdings. The facility should start operating at the end of 2024 once all the equipment has been installed and tested.

CR Microelectronics’s stock price [SHA:688396] was trading up 1.7 percent at CNY56.19 (USD8.30) as of 1 p.m. China time today.

Editor: Kim Taylor