International Business / The Pacific

Xilinx to Invest in Japan Chip Plant: San Jose-based Xilinx Inc. said it will spend as much as $300 million in the semiconductor manufacturing plant to be built and operated by Seiko Epson Corp. in Sakata. The agreement calls for Xilinx to make incremental advance payments to Seiko Epson over the next 2 1/2 years to help finance construction of the plant. In return, Xilinx will receive a specified number of wafers through 2002. Xilinx, the world’s largest supplier of programmable logic devices, said the advanced manufacturing processes it will help develop will allow it to quadruple the density of its products. Production at the facility, about 200 miles north of Tokyo, is scheduled to begin in 1998.