Powerchip in talks with Elpida on merger, other tieups

TAIPEI, March 12 (Reuters) - Powerchip (5346.TWO), Taiwan's top computer memory chip maker, said on Thursday it is in talks with Japan's Elpida (6665.T) on a possible merger or other forms of tie-ups, but no timeframe has being finalised yet. "There are many possibilities and merger is a direction," Powerchip spokesman Eric Tang said.

"But any merger is very complicated and we don't have a time table now," he said.

Powerchip Semiconductor Corp, which makes DRAM chips mainly for personal computers, has long been a manufacturing partner of Elpida Memroy. The two companies have a chip joint venture, Rexhip, in Taiwan. (US$1=T$34.5) (Reporting by Baker Li, Editing by Ken Wills)