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If you're developing analog/mixed signal IP -- especially high-speed stuff like SERDES -- in nodes like N2 DTCO plays a *massive* role in design. You have to find clever ways to use the (very!) restrictive design rules to get the best performance/lowest power out of circuits, and the difference...
N2 doesn't have BSPDN, A16 does -- which is basically N2P with BSPDN added...
A14 is then a shrunk A16 but with frontside power, A14P (2029) has BSPDN added.
The US has got a bit of a problem with solar anyway, what with tariffs and cancelling policies to promote solar/wind and denial of climate change in favour of burning fossil fuels, never mind wanting to make stuff expensively in the USA as opposed to importing much cheaper Chinese panels. Given...
Yes the bit in bold is correct, but it will only happen in multi-GW quantities if they cost no more per kW than single-layer silicon cells and have proved to be long-lasting.
If they also cost less per GW (because a given size panel has more output) then it'll be a no-brainer, the entire...
Which is what I said -- to take over the mass market "new technology" solar cells (like perovskite-on-silicon) have to be competitive on kW/$ with conventional monosilicon cells -- and the cost obviously includes both manufacturing cost and lifetime (and cost to replace them when they die), so...
Not surprising because the worldwide mass solar panel market is clearly driven by kW/$, not kW/m2 where "really premium cells" are targeted.
There are a few applications where kW/m2 wins (e.g. boats and RVs where there's a hard limit on area) but these are tiny markets in comparison to grid...
No, the normal I/O pads are on the backside along the the power rails and PWR/GND pads -- also anything else that needs thick low-resistance metal e.g. inductors and transmission lines in high-speed SERDES.
Regardless of how mature the process is, if Intel yield never catches up with TSMC (and neither does their wafer cost) their die cost will always be higher, even if both drop with time as yield improves.
Wafer cost is higher in recent nodes (and still increasing each new node) due to more...
Yes Intel has done large dies, but that still doesn't mean they had yield comparable with TSMC on them -- when you're an IDM selling a high-end HPC CPU for $10000 it doesn't matter so much if the yield is lower because this is hidden from your customers, there's no direct competition, and your...
I'd have thought that yield is another big reason. Given that Nvidia use reticle-size dies the die yield/cost is heavily dependent on D, and with their massive volumes for many products TSMC are better than anyone else at this -- certainly far better than Samsung for who this has always been a...
Actually it doesn't, HPC is now a far bigger and more profitable market now for Nvidia than gaming PCs -- profitable because Nvidia dominate the market and can command high prices since there's no real credible competitor, at least in volume/revenue and software ecosystem (CUDA) even though AMD...
You're misunderstanding what I said -- I specifically meant for this node (A14), and at this stage in the cost/maturity of high-NA, and given the rate at which the new machines can be manufactured. Which matters much more for TSMC than Intel given their fab/customer volumes and ramp-up rate for...
For TSMC, having a "technological advantage" which doesn't improve PPA but does increase C (and can't scale up capacity fast enough) would be pointless and counterproductive willy-waving, not a good business decision...
OTOH Intel do have a bit of a track record recently for prioritising...
"Competitors are also accelerating the development of 1 nanometer processes. Last April, TSMC made a surprise announcement that it would add 16A technology, meaning 1.6 nanometers, between the existing 1.4 nanometers and 2 nanometers and start production in the second half of 2026. This is an...
