Demand rises in Taiwan for copper in PCBs

摘要

TAIWAN'S Lee Chang Yung Chemical Industry Corp is winding up negotiations with Japanese copper producers over the provision of copper technology, which the chemicals company needs for its new electronic components plant. Taipei-based Lee Chang, a large manufacturer of petrochemicals products including methanol, plans to build a new plant in Hsinchu in northwest Taiwan that will eventually produce 10,000 tpy of copper deposition material used for printed circuit boards. According to Lee Chang, demand for printed circuit boards is buoyant at present because of the country's healthy electronics sector but domestic supplies of the copper cladding material - an important value-added component - satisfy only about 70 percent of demand. Lee Chang calculates that Taiwan imported about 14,000 tonnes of the deposition material last year while the major domestic producers - Taiwan Copper Foil, Nan Ya Plastics and Chang Chun Petrochemical Co - made about 16,000 tonnes.