Air Products (Lehigh Valley, Pa.; www.airproducts.com) has started up a new plant in the Banan District in Chongqing City, western China, to supply China’s highest-generation, most advanced and most efficient TFT-LCD (thin-film transistor liquid crystal display) fab, which is now in operation. The new project represents another investment by the company to serve the fast-paced development of the country’s electronics manufacturing industry. It also further strengthens the company’s market position in western China, particularly Chongqing, which is a fast emerging, key production base for high-technology industries.
The fab, which is owned and operated by Chongqing HKC Optoelectronics Technology Co., a subsidiary of the domestic display leader Huike Electronics (Shenzhen) Co., is located in the Banan Jieshi IT Industrial Park. It is the largest investment in the Banan District and will fuel Chongqing’s ambition of becoming a 100-billion-yuan LCD production base by 2020 under the ‘Made in China 2025’ strategy. Air Products’ high-quality bulk gases, including high-purity nitrogen, oxygen, hydrogen, argon and helium, are being used for its production of 8.6-generation TFT-LCD panels.