True, and it's hopium on my part. The dies could be very small though, possibly even under 100mm^2 (the rumored configuration is 2 P-cores, 4 LPE-cores, and 2 Xe3 cores, certainly with less cache than parts like Panther Lake).
That's what I say.
At this level, it goes well beyond people. SMIC has lured away significant talent from TSMC and they're still way behind. The IP is a lot of infrastructure, processes, design work, formulas, methodologies, etc. There are probably tens of thousands of details that have to be right for successful wafer production at these scales. What we're talking about transcends people and rises to the level of an institution.
Yes, quite possibly.
Isn't that exactly what Intel spent more than half a decade doing, with their nodes from 10 nm to "Intel 7"?
I have to doubt that. Most businesses take out seasonal loans, term revolvers, and other types of loans and financing options to make sure they have sufficient working capital (free cashflow) to help make the actual payment on huge CapEx items and even OpEx. Then there's the Line-of-Credit to also help with floating cash. Businesses tend to have very close relationships with banks and financial institutions in general.
Intel is considering removing 18a from external foundry market and focus on marketing 14a to foundry customers resulting in probable write offs for the investment in 18a (not getting hoped for foundry customers). So, maybe making the node pricing more attractive instead would increase interest in the node particularly if the 18a can be an introduction and becomes a jumpstart into using Intel’s 14a nodes. So it is actually a move forward for customers when they design for 18a?
It has to do with capacity and it’s being used for internal (company /non-foundry customer) products.
I'm not saying that they don't have any loans, but they didn't take any to build the FABs.
No I really mean profits, from 2018 to 2021 they made double the profit per year than usual.
They used to be profitable because they used to make products, ever since 2021 they are only building stuff without being able to produce stuff, it's like being a baker and having your kitchen remodeled...there is no way to bake in that kitchen until it's done.
They stopped promoting it, at least that's the only thing the article says....they did not scrap it, that's your phantasy making that stuff up.
That's like asking 9 women to collaborate on making a baby in 1 month. There's only so much you can do to speed up projects by throwing resources at them, especially late in the cycle.
That's not even true. Their server CPUs all still use in-house nodes and Meteor Lake (now rebranded as the lower-end Arrow Lake laptop CPUs) use Intel nodes for their compute tiles.
I mean, let's say there is 9 females in the kitchen. Right now, you are dedicating 7 females to cook a dish (18A) using a older utensil (low-NA EUV), and 2 females to cook another dish (14A) using another new utensil (High-NA EUV). The new utensil (High-NA EUV) is another beast in it's own that has it's own learning curve, idiosyncrasies, but ASML claims it's more cost-efficient per wafer throughput, which could lead 14A to have a price-per-unit advantage over TSMC. Why not abandon Low-NA EUV for 18A and go 'all-in' on the High-NA EUV for 14A to secure the next process node leadership for Intel? TSMC only has 1 High-NA EUV as a reference. 14A will restore Intel to process leadership AND have a price advantage.
This wasn't accurate until 14nm because of how they reused equipment, facilities and nodes rather efficiently. 14nm had some pretty nasty delays and they like to pretend the first iteration (BDW) wasn't real. Eventually over the lifetime it did pay for itself but that's because it was used in 6 generations worth of products unlike the usual 2-3.
The issue was never really hidden assuming someone actually paid attention to the company. I don't think any of them were surprised at anything except for the wallstreet whiplash when the numbers were made public.
Actually it's only one because AZ Fab 62 hasn't opened yet. Killing 20A for the reason they claimed they did would make all the sense in the world. Using Intel 4 for MTL turned out to be a mistake due to EUV capacity issues . If they truly are messing around with 18A and are de-emphasizing it then I think it's fair to say that reasoning was likely false.
I'm assuming you mean outsource products which would be made on 18A to TSMC. If so then they already did that with LNL and ARL which has hurt the margins on both of those parts. Doing that again with a full lineup would be very bad.
There are zero High-NA machines installed outside of OR right now. ASML hasn't shipped any of the production model at all yet either (I don't know how big of a problem this is in a practical sense, but it's not good). This is likely why Intel was looking at potentially not using it at all for 14A. Even if they do use it for 14A it will be targeted usage which means the vast majority of the equipment is going to be EUV. Having another one and done situation with 18A would likely be a financial disaster.
If I said scrap it, that's not what I meant. They have what they have and it's booked, including the fab that hasn't come online yet. That's not all that he said though:
I’d be hard pressed to believe any of the players in this administration responsible for this domain could be that out of touch. As much railing and complaining about China they can’t just boil it down to factory jobs for a labor force that the Us doesn’t have the skills to supply in the first place? Then again I just read the announcement that they will ease the export of of technology on chips in exchange for rare earth metal deal. The art of the deal I guess … so Joss whedon had it right we’ll all be fluent in mandarin by 2050.
Haven't you every heard the phrase "too many cooks in the kitchen"? When you throw people at a project, what happens is that the experienced and most productive contributors get bogged down having to bring the new people up to speed. This slows down the project and not everything can be parallelized, so the opportunities for the new people to help out are limited. Also, being new, they're way down the learning curve, so even when they can find a place to contribute, they're slow and clumsy, which takes additional time from the existing contributors.
TSMC directly contradicted this assertion, saying they don't expect high-NA to be more cost effective for a couple more generations, at least.
If the US attacks anything in Taiwan, it will find ballistic missiles raining down on all its naval vessels in the eastern Pacific. Starting a hot war with China would be the height of stupidity. It's also a war crime to attack civilian targets, like fabs.
TSMC secret sauce is no their tech, Intel an Samsung have the equivalent technical capabilities, the difference is Intels delivery of that tech to customers. They lack the design to delivery capabilities and interoperability across multiple streams due to always being a foundry focused on delivering their products vs being a contract foundry for others. This is where TSMC excels not IP in technology which Intel is on par and superior in some cases. Let’s not make that mistake … that’s why Intel could make because they have the technical know how … they along with Samsung are the only companies in the world that can deliver leading edge nodes.
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