The Intel 18A Process Is Finally Ready
Despite a long list of issues plaguing chip giant Intel (NASDAQ: INTC), the company has made meaningful progress catching up to TSMC in semiconductor manufacturing. Intel was stuck on its heavily delayed 10 nanometer (nm) process for a long time, which caused all sorts of problems on the product side of the business. The Intel 4 and Intel 3 process nodes, which are used for Meteor Lake PC CPUs and the latest generation of Xeon server CPUs, respectively, were big upgrades for Intel.Intel previously canceled the Intel 20A process, which was meant to be a stepping stone to develop important new technologies. For its latest PC chips, Intel turned to TSMC instead of using the Intel 20A process as it reallocated resources to Intel 18A. The Intel 18A process, the final node in the company's original foundry roadmap, is supposed to bring Intel back to parity with TSMC in terms of performance and efficiency.According to a page on Intel's website, the Intel 18A process is now ready. It's important to understand what "ready" means here. Development of the process is complete, but it will still take time for chips to start rolling out of Intel's factory at high volumes. Intel noted that foundry customer tape outs will begin during the first half of this year. The tape out is the final stage of the design process, with the next step being manufacturing.Continue reading
Despite a long list of issues plaguing chip giant Intel (NASDAQ: INTC), the company has made meaningful progress catching up to TSMC in semiconductor manufacturing. Intel was stuck on its heavily delayed 10 nanometer (nm) process for a long time, which caused all sorts of problems on the product side of the business. The Intel 4 and Intel 3 process nodes, which are used for Meteor Lake PC CPUs and the latest generation of Xeon server CPUs, respectively, were big upgrades for Intel.
Intel previously canceled the Intel 20A process, which was meant to be a stepping stone to develop important new technologies. For its latest PC chips, Intel turned to TSMC instead of using the Intel 20A process as it reallocated resources to Intel 18A. The Intel 18A process, the final node in the company's original foundry roadmap, is supposed to bring Intel back to parity with TSMC in terms of performance and efficiency.
According to a page on Intel's website, the Intel 18A process is now ready. It's important to understand what "ready" means here. Development of the process is complete, but it will still take time for chips to start rolling out of Intel's factory at high volumes. Intel noted that foundry customer tape outs will begin during the first half of this year. The tape out is the final stage of the design process, with the next step being manufacturing.
