Taipei  - Taiwan, the world's second-largest computer chip maker, on Tuesday unveiled guidelines for upgrading its chip industry by offering incentives to chip makers that win foreign technology transfers.

Under the guidelines for integrating the chip industry issued by the Industrial Development Bureau, local chip makers can apply for government funding if they submit "restructuring plans" within three months.

To qualify for the National Development Fund, the restructuring plans must ensure that the foreign partners license intellectual property rights to Taiwan chip markers, must transfer up-to-date technology, and must join in research and development (R&D) and train personnel in Taiwan.

The National Development Fund will decide how much money to allocate to a Taiwan chip company on a case-by-case basis, a bureau official said by phone.

Taiwan is the world's second-largest chip manufacturer after South Korea, and is trying to shake off the image of an OEM (original equipment manufacturing) country, that is making products which bear large international companies' names.

In March, the Economics Ministry announced plans to launch the Taiwan Memory Company (TMC) which would form an alliance with Japan's Elpida Memory Inc, the world's third-largest chip maker.

Dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chips are the main components of personal computers and serve as storage devices for applications running on them. (dpa)