Back in 1998 Hyundai (005380.KS) bought a large tract of land in Eugene, Oregon and spent $1.5b to build a 1.2m ft2 semiconductor production line, eventually employing ~1,400 people. After 10 years of memory chip production the economic downturn in 2008 caused the plant to close, prompting one of the largest layoffs in Oregon history (pre-pandemic). Over the years the idle plant was purchased by Broadcom (AVGO) for $21m but never utilized, and by Corning (GLW) for $13m, who also never developed the site, and last March the plant, which includes a 122,000 ft2 Class – 1 clean room, was about to be auctioned with an opening bid of $1.5m. A private Ohio company in the digital signage business purchased the property just before the auction for $6.3m in April of last year and has begun to resurrect the property that has been shuttered for almost 13 years.
No, this is not an intro to “Mysteries of the Abandoned” on the Science Channel, but the (hopefully) site of what might become the United States’ first micro-LED production facility, or at least that is the hope of Stratacache (pvt), a Dayton, Ohio company that is looking to build out the facility to compete with other potential micro-LED dvelopers and producers in South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and China. The company expects to spend between $150m and $350m to refurbish the plant, with an initial hiring of ~100 employees and an eventual target of ‘several hundred’ according to the company. Stratacache itself is a software and hardware supplier of digital signage for a variety of verticals, with China’s largest display producer BOE (200725.CH) an OEM partner.
Right now progress on the facility has been hampered by the COVID-19 pandemic, however the company says they are in discussions with a number of economic agencies for development funding, although plans call for the plant to begin micro-LED production based on a 300mm Ga-on-Si process by October of this year. We believe some of the remaining 200mm equipment remains and the plant has full access to power and water, so we believe it is possible to establish such a production line, but that timeframe seems a bit ambitious to us. All in, if the plant is eventually resurrected, it would be the first and only micro-LED production facility in the US, a major accomplishment in itself.
No, this is not an intro to “Mysteries of the Abandoned” on the Science Channel, but the (hopefully) site of what might become the United States’ first micro-LED production facility, or at least that is the hope of Stratacache (pvt), a Dayton, Ohio company that is looking to build out the facility to compete with other potential micro-LED dvelopers and producers in South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and China. The company expects to spend between $150m and $350m to refurbish the plant, with an initial hiring of ~100 employees and an eventual target of ‘several hundred’ according to the company. Stratacache itself is a software and hardware supplier of digital signage for a variety of verticals, with China’s largest display producer BOE (200725.CH) an OEM partner.
Right now progress on the facility has been hampered by the COVID-19 pandemic, however the company says they are in discussions with a number of economic agencies for development funding, although plans call for the plant to begin micro-LED production based on a 300mm Ga-on-Si process by October of this year. We believe some of the remaining 200mm equipment remains and the plant has full access to power and water, so we believe it is possible to establish such a production line, but that timeframe seems a bit ambitious to us. All in, if the plant is eventually resurrected, it would be the first and only micro-LED production facility in the US, a major accomplishment in itself.
Stratacache Micro-LED Production Site in Eugene - Source: Southern Oregon Business Journal
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