China's Tsinghua Unigroup on January 18 struck a deal with the municipal government of Nanjing to establish an IC manufacturing site in the Chinese city for developing and producing 3D NAND flash and DRAM products.

Tsinghua Unigroup's planned manufacturing site in Nanjing will cover an area of about 100 hectares, and total investment in the site is estimated at around US$30 billion, according to the state-backed technology conglomerate.

Tsinghua Unigroup will initially inject about US$10 billion to complete the first phase of the plant project, with monthly production set at 100,000 units. Other details including production schedules have not been disclosed.

Tsinghua Unigroup chairman Zhao Weiguo was quoted in recent reports saying the company plans to build IC manufacturing sites in Wuhan, Chengdu and Nanjing with total investment reaching US$70 billion.

Tsinghua Unigroup is assisting subsidiary Yangtze River Storage Technology to establish a new memory plant in Wuhan, Hebei province. Construction of the plant, which will cover an area of about 13 hectares, kicked off recently, according to Tsinghua Unigroup. The facility will be dedicated to producing 3D NAND flash memory, with volume production slated for 2018.