How to Spend $100 Billion Dollars in Three Years

How to Spend $100 Billion Dollars in Three Years
by Scotten Jones on 04-25-2021 at 6:00 am

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TSMC recently announced plans to spend $100 billion dollars over three years on capital. For 2021 they announced $30B in total capital with 80% on advanced nodes (7nm and smaller), 10% on packaging and masks and 10% on “specialty”.

If we take a guess at the capital for each year, we can project something like $30B for 2021 (announced),… Read More


SALELE Double Patterning for 7nm and 5nm Nodes

SALELE Double Patterning for 7nm and 5nm Nodes
by Fred Chen on 03-28-2021 at 6:00 am

SALELE Double Patterning for 7nm and 5nm Nodes 4

In this article, we will explore the use of self-aligned litho-etch-litho-etch (SALELE) double patterning for BEOL metal layers in the 7nm node (40 nm minimum metal pitch [1]) with DUV, and 5nm node (28 nm minimum metal pitch [2]) with EUV. First, we mention the evidence that this technique is being used; Xilinx [3] disclosed the… Read More


Intel’s IDM 2.0

Intel’s IDM 2.0
by Scotten Jones on 03-24-2021 at 4:00 am

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In January I presented at the ISS conference a comparison of Intel’s, Samsung’s and TSMC’s leading edge offerings. You can read a write-up of my presentation here.

With the problems going on at Intel, that article generated a lot of interest in the investment community, and I have been holding a lot of calls with analysts who are trying… Read More


SPIE 2021 – ASML DUV and EUV Updates

SPIE 2021 – ASML DUV and EUV Updates
by Scotten Jones on 03-17-2021 at 10:00 am

SPIE DUV 2021 ASML NXT4 DryWet Presentation final noWPD2 Page 42

At the SPIE Advanced Lithography Conference held in February, ASML presented the latest information on their Deep Ultraviolet (DUV) and Extreme Ultraviolet (EUV) exposure systems. I recently got to interview Mike Lercel of ASML to discuss the presentations.

DUV

Despite all the attention EUV is getting, most layers are still… Read More


Register File Design at the 5nm Node

Register File Design at the 5nm Node
by Tom Dillinger on 03-10-2021 at 2:00 pm

lowVt bitcell

“What are the tradeoffs when designing a register file?”  Engineering graduates pursuing a career in microelectronics might expect to be asked this question during a job interview.  (I was.)

On the surface, one might reply, “Well, a register file is just like any other memory array – address inputs, data inputs and outputs, read/writeRead More


TSMC Plans Six Wafer Fabs in Arizona

TSMC Plans Six Wafer Fabs in Arizona
by Scotten Jones on 03-10-2021 at 10:00 am

TSMC Fab 18 Remdering

There are reports in the media that TSMC is now planning six Fabs in Arizona (the image above is Fab 18 in Taiwan). The original post I saw referred to a Megafab and claimed six fabs with 100,000 wafers per month of capacity (wpm) for $35 billion dollars. The report further claimed it would be larger than TSMC fabs in Taiwan.

This report… Read More


Intel Node Names

Intel Node Names
by Scotten Jones on 02-15-2021 at 6:00 am

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There is a lot of interest right now in how Intel compares to the leading foundries and what the future may hold.

Several years ago, I published several extremely popular articles converting processes from various companies to “Equivalent Nodes” (EN). Nodes were at one time based on actual physical features of processes but had… Read More


ISS 2021 – Scotten W. Jones – Logic Leadership in the PPAC era

ISS 2021 – Scotten W. Jones – Logic Leadership in the PPAC era
by Scotten Jones on 01-15-2021 at 6:00 am

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I was asked to give a talk at the 2021 ISS conference and the following is a write up of the talk.

The title of the talk is “Logic Leadership in the PPAC era”.

The talk is broken up into three main sections:

  1. Background information explaining PPAC and Standard Cells.
  2. A node-by-node comparisons of companies running leading edge logic
Read More

IEDM 2020 Starts this Weekend

IEDM 2020 Starts this Weekend
by Scotten Jones on 12-10-2020 at 6:00 am

IEDM 2020 Logo

As I have discussed before, I believe that IEDM is the premier technical conference for understanding leading edge process technologies. Beginning this coming weekend, this year’s edition of IEDM will be held virtually, and I highly recommend attending.

The conference held a press briefing last Monday. The tutorial and short… Read More


No Intel and Samsung are not passing TSMC

No Intel and Samsung are not passing TSMC
by Scotten Jones on 12-02-2020 at 6:00 am

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Seeking Alpha just published an article about Intel and Samsung passing TSMC for process leadership. The Intel part seems to be a theme with them, they have talked in the past about how Intel does bigger density improvements with each generation than the foundries but forget that the foundries are doing 5 nodes in the time it takes… Read More