"The Core i3 move to a 5nm process is set to be followed by mid-range and high-end CPUs being produced for Intel by TSMC on a 3nm process in 2H22."
So Intel becoming Fabless is a matter of time?
So Intel becoming Fabless is a matter of time?
There's a lot of working going on with 10nm and 7nm to fix the production problems (because a lot of work is still required). It won't happen overnight, in fact, I predicted about a year or two ago that it would be around 2023, +/- 6 months, that Intel would have its node production problems mostly ironed out.
Sadly by then, TSMC should be at 3nm, and while Intel's 10nm is easily a match for TSMC's 7nm, it won't be enough to be competitive against TSMC 5nm and 3nm. I hope that Intel has their shit together for the 7nm node, or can at least break even on it. If they can break even (cost of wafer is equal to or less than what they can sell the chips for) on 7nm, they'll be able to hang in there until they get the 5nm / 3nm nodes up and running.
If Intel drops the ball though... and they aren't able to get 10nm yields over 90% by 2023 and if they can't get 7nm yields at a reasonable point... well that's a whole different ball game for Intel. It might not be out of the question for Intel to approach the US government about either subsidies, tax breaks, custom manufacturing for military applications, etc., in order to 1) keep Intel viable until the engineering challenges are resolved and 2) prevent the offshoring of all semiconductor fabs.
Put simply, Intel staying competitive is a matter of national security for the United States.
Best company I worked at -- small startup -- would always do 2-3 R&D initiatives in parallel. One would be conservative (guaranteed results). One would be super-high-risk (huge payoff if it works). Sometimes there would be one or two more. It was all a big hedge. Some panned out, some didn't, and when we hit the market, our technology was like science fiction. Competition didn't know what hit them.
That would run a fair bit of coin, but fairly little on the national scale.
(Footnote: Not a software company)
I think the most detail I can give is general class of work it engaged in. Think of MRIs, sonar, radar, ultrasound, back-scatter x-ray, LIDAR, CAT scans, etc. That's the general sort of technology it worked on.
That should give enough detail for the purposes of this discussion...
I like the explanation and rationale given in Design Rules https://www.amazon.com/Design-Rules-Vol-Power-Modularity/dp/..., though there's plenty of others.
I don't know the answer, but it is an important warning to keep in mind when making decisions.
In addition, more and more AI/ML accelerator startups show up with even more need for wafers and ASML has 2 year old orders on the backlog (half of their EUV's machines last year went just to TSMC).
Clearly evidence of the "free market" working on human prosperity. Oh, wait, no it's the opposite. Innovation killed over a monopoly's power. Cool, cool, cool.
This sort of anti-competitive behavior should be illegal. How is it okay to just clog your competitors supply line, when they got the better tech you just can't up?
GF has basically given up on 10nm and smaller nodes.
Maybe not legally, but if their (partial) intention is to retard AMD's design success, it's at least what is considered "a dick move".
Intel is strong-arming AMD on many fronts AFAIK, I sincerely hope they vanish into insignificance for their dick-locomotion nature. And I also hope the EU succeeds at spinning up their own fabs. And that ancaps one day see the light of regulation.
I want fancy tech and scifi and wealth for everyone, and the free-market doesn't deliver. It's all monopolies and patent wars...
> AMD's design success
The market is showing us that the value center isn't design, it's fab. Which AMD gave up on. The lack of competition that's squeezing them is the very pile of dung they created by dropping their foundries.
That's Intel's legacy at work. They got the cash (but nothing else) to do this. So Intel _is playing its market position.
Of course TSMC is the real winner, but in AMD vs Intel, they are just another resource.
You're assuming the legal system is intended to foster competition and prevent the formation of monopolies. That is not the case. The examples of this occurring are exceptions to the rule. And as evidence, you can examine the concentration of wealth, and investment capital in the USA (or other developed capitalist countries).
If you want volume from TSMC you make a big order, you sign a contract, and then put down a billion dollars or two and TSMC will build you a nice new fab for your needs.
That's more or less how it works. TSMC doesn't allow itself to be in a position to have to screw one customer for another customer. It would destroy the trust that customers need to put the survival of their business in TSMC's hands.
They're considering it as an interim solution IMHO. To buy time for their own processes.
And it's not cheap or quick to refit a memory fab to produce processors.
How much smaller than 3nm, can transistor sizes go? 2 nm? 1 nm? O.5 nm?
Think about it this way: you're doping semiconductors by adding a few other atoms. On the order of 1 dopant atom per 1M intrinsic (undopped) semiconductor. How thin can you make it before there's only a dozen dopant atoms? And then, how do you make sure they are evenly distributed? And in the same way across multiple transistors, to guarantee a consistent performance? Yield is key, at this scale.
Technically, they can still improve density by embracing 3D. A friend of mine works on multi-gate vertical nanowire transistors, for instance, but that's still a few years (or a decade?) away from the fab.
The above is on a case by case basis. So they may share some complex part, and some other (possibly more complex) they decide isn't worth sharing.