Thursday, October 14th 2021
TSMC Confirmed to Build New Fab in Japan Together with Sony
Remember that rumour from last week about TSMC potentially building a fab in Japan and partnering up with Sony? Well, the deal is on and the fab is set to start construction in 2022, with production expected to start sometime in 2024. However, as mentioned, the fab isn't going to be using any cutting edge technology when it comes to the process node, since it's intended for imaging sensors and EV components.
The new fab is said to focus on 28 and 22 nm nodes, according to Tim Culpan, who writes for Bloomberg and who has been reporting on TSMC for at least the last decade. This is backed up by the Nikkei that reports that the US$7 billion fab will make chips in the 20-nm range, without going into further details beyond mentioning these nodes are over a decade old. That said, there are still plenty of products made on older nodes than that, as not everything has to be built on a cutting edge node and many components wouldn't benefit from a smaller node. Regardless, this fab won't help with the current shortage of components, but will hopefully lead to better availability of certain components in the future.
Sources:
the Nikkei, @tculpan
The new fab is said to focus on 28 and 22 nm nodes, according to Tim Culpan, who writes for Bloomberg and who has been reporting on TSMC for at least the last decade. This is backed up by the Nikkei that reports that the US$7 billion fab will make chips in the 20-nm range, without going into further details beyond mentioning these nodes are over a decade old. That said, there are still plenty of products made on older nodes than that, as not everything has to be built on a cutting edge node and many components wouldn't benefit from a smaller node. Regardless, this fab won't help with the current shortage of components, but will hopefully lead to better availability of certain components in the future.
12 Comments on TSMC Confirmed to Build New Fab in Japan Together with Sony
A new TSMC Fab should be founded in Europe, period.
iot.eetimes.com/
Tho unlike US and Japan there are currenty no concrete plans yet.
To some IoT is apparently cloud software.How much of your tax money are you willing to spend? Besides, do Europe need another 2x nanometre fab? I don't think so, as there are fabs capable of that kind of nodes already. What Europe needs is a cutting edge fab and they cost a lot more and have different requirements.
Not sure if parts will be made for those kind of things there, although I guess 28 and 20nm nodes are still acceptable for MCUs.