US chip giant Synopsys ramps up design venture in Vietnam

Synopsys, Inc. is seeking to make Vietnam a hub to foster chip design engineers via its partnership with the Saigon Hi-Tech Park in Ho Chi Minh City, the country’s economic powerhouse.

The American corporation, a global leader in electronic design automation (EDA), kicked off the partnership via a memorandum of understanding signed this August to re-direct its operations to avoid the China-U.S. tech war by moving part of its engineer training to Vietnam.

The global leader opened its Vietnam office in 2016 in HCMC. A chip design center at the Saigon Hi-Tech Park (SHTP) that opened this October is seen as a major step in developing the semiconductor industry in the country. The facility’s name is SCDC, or the SHTP Chip Design Center.

As part of the partnership, Synopsys has donated software licenses worth dozens of millions of U.S. dollars to SCDC’s Chip Design Lab through the Synopsys University Software Program, an initiative that aims to inspire and foster the next generation of technologists and innovators. The program provides academic and research institutions with exclusive membership to Synopsys’ EDA tools and technology needed to prepare highly-skilled graduates to become professionals.

Earlier this December, Synopsys and SHTP started their first co-organized training course on chip design training for universities in HCMC.

The partnership also has plans to roll out multi-project wafer (MPW) services via collaboration with other international chipmakers.

Globally, multi-project chip (MPC) and MPW semiconductor manufacturing arrangements allow customers to share mask and microelectronics wafer fabrication costs between several designs or projects.

In electronics, a wafer is a thin slice of semiconductor used for the fabrication of integrated circuits (ICs) to manufacture solar cells for solar power generation.

SHTP in HCMC is already home to American giant chipmaker Intel’s single largest assembly and test plant - Intel Products Vietnam. With a total investment of $1.5 billion to date, it is the largest U.S. high-tech investment in Vietnam. Intel also has plans to expand its operations in the country.

According to Synopsys Vietnam, between 2020 and 2022, its workforce has more than doubled to 490 from 210.

This August, Synopsys Vietnam was named among “the Best Companies to Work for in Asia” by leading human resources publication HR Asia.