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Discussion Leading Edge Foundry Node advances (TSMC, Samsung Foundry, Intel) - [2020 - 2025]

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DisEnchantment

DisEnchantment

Golden Member
TSMC's N7 EUV is now in its second year of production and N5 is contributing to revenue for TSMC this quarter. N3 is scheduled for 2022 and I believe they have a good chance to reach that target.

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N7 performance is more or less understood.
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This year and next year TSMC is mainly increasing capacity to meet demands.

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For Samsung the nodes are basically the same from 7LPP to 4 LPE, they just add incremental scaling boosters while the bulk of the tech is the same.

Samsung is already shipping 7LPP and will ship 6LPP in H2. Hopefully they fix any issues if at all.
They have two more intermediate nodes in between before going to 3GAE, most likely 5LPE will ship next year but for 4LPE it will probably be back to back with 3GAA since 3GAA is a parallel development with 7LPP enhancements.

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Samsung's 3GAA will go for HVM in 2022 most likely, similar timeframe to TSMC's N3.
There are major differences in how the transistor will be fabricated due to the GAA but density for sure Samsung will be behind N3.
But there might be advantages for Samsung with regards to power and performance, so it may be better suited for some applications.
But for now we don't know how much of this is true and we can only rely on the marketing material.

This year there should be a lot more available wafers due to lack of demand from Smartphone vendors and increased capacity from TSMC and Samsung.
Lots of SoCs which dont need to be top end will be fabbed with N7 or 7LPP/6LPP instead of N5, so there will be lots of wafers around.

Most of the current 7nm designs are far from the advertized density from TSMC and Samsung. There is still potential for density increase compared to currently shipping products.
N5 is going to be the leading foundry node for the next couple of years.

For a lot of fabless companies out there, the processes and capacity available are quite good.

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FEEL FREE TO CREATE A NEW THREAD FOR 2025+ OUTLOOK, I WILL LINK IT HERE
 
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Khato said:
The context of the conversation was future investments, not historical.
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Pace of construction and investment is accelerating. The first fab sold out its capacity immediately, and there is not going to be a shortage of orders from US based fabless companies as far as eye can see.

TSMC has so many orders, they have to turn some customers away, reduce their order sizes. Why not continue to build at a place that has plentiful power, space, workforce and customers?
 
fastandfurious6 said:
What is the real benefit for TSMC to build fabs in the United States of America?
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It more-or-less secures US customers for your N-1/N-2 node that you plan to produce in those fabs. Demand for wafers is pretty high right now. Having some extra N4 (or whatever) is not a bad thing. And of course it aligns with the geopolitical concerns already mentioned here.
 
Joe NYC said:
Why not continue to build at a place that has plentiful power, space, workforce and customers?
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Well, the US at least has half of those requirements covered - space and customers. There remains a gap in available skilled workforce for semiconductor manufacturing in the US. Then AI combined with a preference towards shareholders rather than infrastructure over the last few decades has resulted in power by no means being plentiful.

To be clear, I fully expect TSMC to continue their current pace of expansion in Arizona. I just highly doubt they'll get anywhere near the lofty numbers they're currently throwing around to keep tariffs at bay.
 
Joe NYC said:
TSMC has so many orders, they have to turn some customers away, reduce their order sizes. Why not continue to build at a place that has plentiful power, space, workforce and customers?
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Cause TSMC is a manufacturing like Memory companies unlike their customers what if the AI bubble pops and they are left with unfilled fabs if customer cancels contracts? Customer will just cancel and pay whatever in the contract but TSMC will be left with losses .
 
511 said:
Cause TSMC is a manufacturing like Memory companies unlike their customers what if the AI bubble pops and they are left with unfilled fabs if customer cancels contracts? Customer will just cancel and pay whatever in the contract but TSMC will be left with losses .
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That's why they make some customers pay up front for allocations.
 
DrMrLordX said:
That's why they make some customers pay up front for allocations.
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There must be a cancellation clause in contract though cause if you want to cancel you have to pay us but Hyperscalers and Nvidia Apple has insane FCF so they would be fine
 
Win2012R2 said:
Why not?

Because their homeland will lose silicon shield and they will lose everything, including freedom. Plus there is zero chance they will be able to keep their trade secrets, which will end up in China.
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It won't cause the Heart of TSMC is in Taiwan the Core R&D is in Taiwan the know how will be in Taiwan
 
Pretty sure they’ll torch the place if it were ever to come to it. They won’t let anything usable get into the hands of the Chinese.
 
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Joe NYC said:
I have not heard anything about TSMC doing that. I think that's not really part of the plan right now. They want big numbers, and big numbers are easier to deliver with shiny new equipment and advance process nodes.
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They said they're designing in the capability for downgrades "in the future". That is, if they build a bunch of capacity to serve the AI bubble, when the bubble bursts they won't need as much capacity at the nodes they were built for. So they can retool some of the lines in the fab for older nodes. With their ability to set prices they'll be able to depreciate fabs so quickly it won't matter that they are retooling (for example) 75% of the lines in a fab to older nodes that have lower margins. The fab will already have been paid for, and that's better than having a lot of idle capacity because they overbuilt for a bubble everyone knows will blow they just don't know when.
 
Joe NYC said:
Between:
- TSMC management
- US Government
- Taiwan government

Taiwan government is the least consequential entity. A medium strength fart from the two above can reverse its policy.
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hardly , when the men rock up with the guns people fall in line pretty quick.

The Taiwanese government has the entire first world enconmy over a barrel, to believe anything else in naive.
 
511 said:
It won't cause the Heart of TSMC is in Taiwan the Core R&D is in Taiwan the know how will be in Taiwan
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Taiwan is recognised by the whole world as part of China, so that's where the heart is.
jdubs03 said:
Pretty sure they’ll torch the place if it were ever to come to it. They won’t let anything usable get into the hands of the Chinese.
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And then what - go straight to labour camps to dig uranium OR keep it in tact and keep the nicely paid jobs. Either way it won't stop China.
 
Win2012R2 said:
Taiwan is recognised by the whole world as part of China, so that's where the heart is.
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Not the whole world. And that’s because they’re being polite. Most people, certainly those in the West, who pay attention see them as distinct. Otherwise they wouldn’t get weapons shipments to defend themselves.
Win2012R2 said:
And then what - go straight to labour camps to dig uranium OR keep it in tact and keep the nicely paid jobs. Either way it won't stop China.
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Yeah under gun point. Nicely paid HA. More like not dead, thats your payment.

It certainly wouldn’t stop them by just giving it all up of course not.

Also it wouldn’t really be the workers at fault if things went kaboom. That would clearly be management.

And yes, it would. It would prevent them from getting easily accessible EUV technology. They can propaganda as all they want about their current prototype. That is a whole lot different than having a bunch of them sitting right in front of your face.
 
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