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Related: There is a massive TSMC factory being built in Japan right now. Take a look at the pictures, I've never seen this many cranes at one location: https:/

• adeptima 4y ago
  "The plant will produce 22-nanometer and 28-nanometer chips to address strong global demand for speciality chip technologies, they said" I'm curious why not the latest - 3nm, 5nm
  • detaro 4y ago
    There is no spare capacity to build highest-end process fabs, and there is huge demand for capacity in 22/28nm too.
    • sylware 4y ago
      "spare capacity" ? what do you mean ? Taiwan and South Korea are enough to supply the world demand? Well, it is still hard to get your hands on top-notch chips at a reasonable price whatever the news is saying...
      • kuschku 4y ago
        You need certain machines for EUV. There's only one manufacturer (ASML) for those, and they're at capacity. And even if they wanted to scale up, there's only one manufacturer (Zeiss) for the EUV mirrors required for those machines, and all their capacity for the next years is already bought as well.
        • throwawaylinux 4y ago
          DUV seems to be economical down to about 7nm though.
          • kuschku 4y ago
            From what Intel put out in marketing materials, even at 14nm they had a very unreliable process with DUV. So, it might not be economical for the type of IC produced in these factories.
            • sylware 4y ago
              So it means that chinese SMIC announced '7nm' implies they have EUV working?
              • Sakos 4y ago
                No, they don't have EUV. They have 7nm which they're doing with DUV, but they're hitting the same issues Intel did with abysmal yields and there's no guarantee that SMIC will be able to solve something Intel was never able to.
                • sylware 4y ago
                  ... unless they jump onto the EUV train. That said heard that japan may come back as a top-notch silicium country with... nanoimprint?!
                  • ohazi 4y ago
                    They're sanctioned, they can't just "jump"
                    • sylware 4y ago
                      come on... ofc they would have to do the whole R&D.
      • paulmd 4y ago
        > Well, it is still hard to get your hands on top-notch chips at a reasonable price whatever the news is saying... it's really not and actually the slowdown is so bad that AMD has had to reduce production, as well as other companies reducing memory/flash wafer starts etc. it's not just intel or fake news, availability really hasn't been a problem for a year or more at this point, and if anything we're starting to shift into the "glut" phase of the bullwhip cycle.
        • reportingsjr 4y ago
          It depends on what you're looking at. I develop electronics hardware, and it is still incredibly difficult to get a lot of ICs. Texas instruments still has not caught up, and their chips are used just about everything, including on graphics cards.
          • paulmd 4y ago
            yeah that's fair, the embedded market (both power, microcontrollers, and others) is still fucked up, but, the leading-edge market is in oversupply at this point and companies are starting to pull back production hard.
  • svnt 4y ago
    They may be preparing to do both, and in both the US and Japan. Their statement is then technically true and does not upset the mainland.
  • AlgorithmicTime 4y ago
  • PartiallyTyped 4y ago
    To produce 3nm and 5nm, you need to order fabs from ASML who has an enormous backlog.. On the other hand, 22nm and 28nm are almost 10 year old technologies and they are still used in cars, so much so that the industry is begging car manufacturers to get to newer nodes [1]. [1] https://www.theregister.com/2021/10/19/chip_manufacturer_chips/ https://www.theregister.com/2021/10/19/chip_manufacturer_chi...
  • dr-detroit 4y ago
  • bluGill 4y ago
    Good enough. There is nothing wrong with existing parts and so why spend money to design new ones. Inflation is bad enough without having to pay for new engineering as well
  • xadhominemx 4y ago
    Japanese customers like Sony and Renesas have growing demand on 22/28nm
  • blihp 4y ago
    Cost... both to design for the node and to manufacture on it. A lot of products don't need the latest and greatest process node, they just need economical capacity.
  • deqwer 4y ago
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  • bouncycastle 4y ago
    Because Moore's Law has stopped at 28nm. https://www.eetimes.com/28nm-was-last-node-of-moores-law/ https://www.eetimes.com/28nm-was-last-node-of-moores-law/
  • Balgair 4y ago
    National security. TSMC is one of the key players in the 21st century. As we've seen with the supply chain issues from covid and the Ukrainian conflict, high quality semiconductors are a vital resource for modern nations' security and economies. TSMC is the only entity that can make the highest quality chips (3nm being not actually 3nm, but just called that way for marketing purposes). If Taiwan looses that unique ability, they then loose much of the backing of NATO-aligned nations. Taiwan bet the whole nation on TSMC, and it's paid off thus far. They're not likely to let go the trump cards they hold. More on the issues with Taiwan and China here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6sCsOdqXQw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6sCsOdqXQw
    • steve_taylor 4y ago
      That’s quite the gamble. If a competitor develops a 5nm capability, Taiwan and TSMC are both screwed. The fact that only TSMC in Taiwan has this capability makes Taiwan a jucier target for the CCP. All this talk of reunification may be little more than a power grab. Control the best semiconductors, control the world.
      • porknubbins 4y ago
        What is TSMC/Taiwan’s unique capability? Aren’t ASML in Europe the ones making cutting edge EUV machines that drive process shrinks? I genuinely don’t know but I assume TSMC is mostly just good at scaling the production up economically.
        • daemoens 4y ago
          Doing it economically is still incredibly challenging, and there's a reason why they're so far ahead of everybody else.
        • rasz 4y ago
          Everyone can buy top of the line kitchenware, but you need great cooks to run 5 star restaurant. Its all about tuning to reach good yields, TSMC seems to excel at that.
• reportingsjr 4y ago
  I saw some pictures a while ago on twitter of their new fab in Arizona under construction. It looked pretty similar. TSMC means business when they start building out. I don't want to imagine handling logistics on a construction site like this!
  • deqwer 4y ago
    I had friends in Taiwan construction industry. They said TSMC will pay them extra just to make the construction time shorter, even 2x the cost. So you see firms love working with TSMC since they can get higher margin than typical factory construction.
  • downrightmike 4y ago
    Time is money. And they are making bank.
• incomingpain 4y ago
  The massive war with China has left obvious key issues in chip fabrication. The reason or whatever for the ongoing war with china doesn't matter. Similar factories are being built in Germany by Infineon: https://www.infineon.com/cms/en/about-infineon/press/press-releases/2021/INFXX202109-098.html https://www.infineon.com/cms/en/about-infineon/press/press-r... Samsung in Texas: https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/samsung-plans-17-billion-chip-plant-in-taylor-texas/ https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/samsung-plans-17-... Intel in Arizona: https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/23/intel-is-spending-20-billion-to-build-two-new-chip-plants-in-arizona.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/23/intel-is-spending-20-billion... Samsung/SK in Korea: https://fortune.com/2021/05/13/south-korea-chip-semiconductor-samsung-hynix/ https://fortune.com/2021/05/13/south-korea-chip-semiconducto... India is doing something with Risc-V: https://pib.gov.in/PressReleaseIframePage.aspx?PRID=1820621 https://pib.gov.in/PressReleaseIframePage.aspx?PRID=1820621 Overall, divestment from china seems to be the goal. But this many new factories being produced is going to overproduce chips and eliminate any profitability; but inexpensive chips like this will most likely create a boon to the economies.
  • undersuit 4y ago
    If the US was really serious about microchips being critical infrastructure we'd want over production. We have more roads than makes sense, we should have more chips on-hand than our critical power and data infrastructure needs to be rebuilt in the event of a catastrophe.
    • tobyjsullivan 4y ago
      Strategies like this are how you end up with warehouses full of rusting parts. Government-funded overproduction leads to stockpiling at the taxpayer's expense. It's been done many times before (weapons, food, etc.) and always leads to the exact same result: garbage heaps and no available resources when they're actually needed. Offering companies grants and favors to encourage building real, sustainable, on-shore businesses has a much higher likelihood of success.
      • undersuit 4y ago
• habibur 4y ago
  and then what? it will take several years to be operational. and people are afraid things might escalate within months.
• waste_monk 4y ago
  Perhaps if the construction site grows large enough they could make a senbazuru.