Moore’s Law Wiki

Overview

Moore’s Law is an empirical observation stating that the number of transistors on a microchip doubles approximately every two years, leading to exponential improvements in computing performance, efficiency, and cost per function. It has been a guiding principle for the semiconductor industry for over five decades, driving innovation in microprocessors, memory, and system-on-chip (SoC) designs.

Although not a physical law of nature, Moore’s Law has served as a roadmap and self-fulfilling prophecy, inspiring advancements in lithography, materials, packaging, and architectural techniques.

📜 Origin

Coined by: Gordon E. Moore, co-founder of Intel Corporation.
Original prediction (1965): Transistors would double every year.
Revised (1975): The doubling rate slowed to every two years.
Published in Electronics Magazine, Moore’s article projected growth for about a decade—but the trend persisted far longer.

📊 Implications of Moore’s Law

Domain	Impact
Performance	Faster CPUs, GPUs, DSPs, and AI accelerators
Power Efficiency	More operations per watt enabling mobile and edge devices
Cost per Function	Lower price per transistor and lower system cost
Miniaturization	Enabled smartphones, wearables, and embedded AI
Innovation Cycles	Pushed fabs and chipmakers to adopt smaller process nodes regularly

🏭 Moore’s Law and Semiconductor Scaling

Generation	Approx. Node (nm)	Transistor Count Example
1970s	10,000 nm (10 µm)	Intel 4004 (2,300 transistors)
1990s	~350–180 nm	Pentium processors (1–5M transistors)
2010s	32–7 nm	Intel Core / Apple A-series (1–10B+)
2020s	5–2 nm	Apple M3, NVIDIA Hopper, TSMC N2
Future	<2 nm	Gate-All-Around (GAA), CFET, 3D stacking

🧠 Extensions of Moore’s Law

To sustain Moore’s Law, the industry began innovating beyond pure transistor shrinking:

1. More-than-Moore (MtM)

Adds functionality via heterogeneous integration: sensors, RF, analog, photonics.

2. 3D IC / Advanced Packaging

Technologies like TSMC CoWoS, Intel Foveros, and chiplets/UCIe increase effective transistor density through vertical and modular scaling.

3. Design Technology Co-Optimization (DTCO)

Co-designing devices, standard cells, EDA tools, and libraries for each process node.

4. System Technology Co-Optimization (STCO)

System-level optimization including power delivery, thermals, interconnect, and memory hierarchy.

🛠️ Physical and Economic Limits

Moore’s Law has slowed due to multiple constraints:

Constraint	Description
Quantum effects	Electrons tunnel at very small scales
Heat dissipation	Power density increases with scaling
Complexity and cost	Sub-5nm fabs cost $20B+ and require EUV
Design challenges	Verification, DFM, and yield losses escalate

Despite these, innovations like EUV lithography, GAA-FETs, AI-driven design, and chiplets are extending its relevance.

📉 Is Moore’s Law Dead?

While classic scaling has slowed, many argue Moore’s Law is evolving, not ending:

Intel, TSMC, and Samsung continue roadmap development through 2nm, GAA-FETs, and 3D packaging.
NVIDIA, Apple, AMD, and others drive performance-per-watt via architecture and software optimization.
AI acceleration, heterogeneous compute, and domain-specific architectures are enabling post-Moore growth.

📚 Related Concepts

Concept	Description
Dennard Scaling	Voltage and power scaled with size (broken around 2006)
Wright’s Law	Cost declines with cumulative production
Koomey’s Law	Compute per joule doubles ~2 years
Bell’s Law	New classes of computing emerge every decade
More-than-Moore	System-level enhancements beyond transistor scaling

🏢 Organizations Driving Moore’s Law

Intel: Moore’s Law originator and process scaling leader.
TSMC: Leading foundry enabling 3nm and below nodes.
Samsung: Pioneer of GAA transistor implementation.
ASML: Developer of EUV lithography tools.
IBM: Advanced node R&D, including 2nm and 3D chip stacking.

🧾 Famous Quotes

🗣️ Gordon E. Moore (Co-founder of Intel)

“The number of transistors incorporated in a chip will approximately double every 24 months.”
— 1975 revision of his original 1965 prediction

“What I was trying to do was to get that message across — that this was the direction the industry was going.”
— On the origin of Moore’s Law

“It can’t continue forever. The nature of exponentials is that you push them out and eventually disaster happens.”
— Acknowledging the physical limits of Moore’s Law