From the very start I continually asked the GF guys what their value proposition is other than, “We are not TSMC”, which seems to be the easy way to foundry riches but clearly is not. In the early days of GF there was a lot of pride, pomp, and circumstance but that does not necessarily sell wafers. Today we are seeing a very different GF focused on implementation and increased transparency which leads to the most important business asset today, trust!
The Foundry Files Blog is a new feature on the GF website which I’m happy to promote. Blogging is an opportunity for companies to be transparent and represent themselves as real people and build trust within their business environment.
To start, Michael Noonan and Mojy Chian will be blogging. Mike is Executive Vice President, Worldwide Marketing and Sales, for GLOBALFOUNDRIES. In this role, he is responsible for global customer relationships as well as all marketing, sales, customer engineering and quality functions. Read more about Mike here. Mojy is Senior Vice President, Design Enablement at GLOBALFOUNDRIES. He is responsible for global design enablement, services, and solutions and is the primary technical customer interface for the company. Read more about Mojy here.
I first met Mike when he was with NXP and before that he was with National Semiconductor. I first met Mojy at Conexant and worked with him again at Altera. Please recognize that these gentlemen are industry leaders and this is a VERY important communication channel for the greater good of the semiconductor ecosystem so please take advantage of this very unique opportunity.
I blogged about Mojy’s first entry Re-defining Collaboration on SemiWiki HERE. This blog is about Mike’s entry Execution, Innovation, Location: 3 Reasons to Choose GLOBALFOUNDRIES at 28nm.
Execution is obvious, you need to ship wafers and they are doing that today shipping more than 250,000 32nm and 28nm HKMG wafers:
“In just one quarter, we were able to see more than a doubling of yields on 32nm, allowing us to exit 2011 having exceeded our 32nm product shipment requirements. Based on this successful ramp of 32nm HKMG, we are committed to moving ahead on 28nm with GLOBALFOUNDRIES.” AMD CEO Rory Read.
Innovation is key and here is what Mike has to say about innovation and their 28nm:
- ~100 percent density increase.
- Up to 50 percent increased speed and 50 percent reduction in energy/switch.
- Sustains 40nm layout style advantages: Bi-directional Poly, Poly Jogs, Large Caps.
- ~20% smaller die relative to 28nm “Gate Last.”
Location is an interesting part of the value proposition and one worth more discussion. Now that GLOBALFOUNDRIES is the second largest pure-play foundry in the world with manufacturing plants located in Europe, Asia, and North America, is location important? You tell me. Why does Intel, the number one semiconductor company, have fabs all over the world? Why is Samsung, the number two semiconductor company, building fabs in North America and China? Location, location, location……
Next Generation of Systems Design at Siemens