Tower Semiconductor gets $300 mln in funding

Tower Semiconductor (Nasdaq: TSEM) on Tuesday said it has raised $300 million for a new production facility.

The company inked separate deals with Israel Corp., Macronix International Corp (Nasdaq:MXICY), and QuickLogic Corp. (Nasdaq: QUIK).

Shares of Tower Semiconductor closed yesterday's session up over 15 percent, rising 2.19 to 16.69. QuickLogic Corp.'s stock inched up 0.06 to 8.69 while Macronix gained 0.06 to 15.13.

Tower plans to use the funds to build a new production facility in Israel, which will employ about 1,000 people and increase the company's silicon wafer production capacity.

Israel Corp., Tower's principal shareholder, will invest $50 million ordinary shares. Macronix will contribute a $75 million equity stake and get representation on Tower's Board, while QuickLogic will make a $25 million equity investment.

The two latter companies also have received production commitments from the new facility.

These deals add to existing investment agreements, announced earlier this year, between Tower and SanDisk Corp.(Nasdaq:SNDK) and Alliance Semiconductor (Nasdaq: ALSC).

Tower said it plans to start building the new plant in the next couple of weeks.