( ESNUG 505 Item 1 ) -------------------------------------------- [05/24/12]
Subject: TSMC & UMC 28 nm, TI, Nvidia "priority", Qualcomm, Forbes magazine
Last week, Taiwan Economic News reported UMC "has won 80 28 nm tapeouts".
During his 11Q4 financial call Morris Chang, CEO of TSMC said:
"We have so far completed 36 individual 28 nm tapeouts in 2011 and
have scheduled another 132 individual product tapeouts in 2012."
- Morris Chang, CEO of TSMC (01/18/12)
This 132 vs. 80 tape-outs for 2012 is due to TSMC's capacity problems:
"The success of UMC is thought to have derived from a shortage of
capacity at TSMC. UMC started general production of 28 nm in Q1;
TSMC started in Q4."
- ElectronicsWeekly.com (05/17/12)
Thus benefiting UMC 28 nm:
"This year, primary buyers of UMC's 28 nm process capacity would
be Texas Instruments (TI) and Qualcomm. TI's ARM-based multi-core
processor OMAP 5 is a 28 nm process product while Qualcomm has
contracted UMC to make its integrated baseband chips in the
pilot stage."
- CENS.com (05/17/12)
In related news, rumor is TSMC just gave Nvidia "priority" for 28 nm:
"Apparently as the rumors say, Nvidia has been hunting for new
foundry partners that could meet up its supply demand with
Samsung already preparing qualification samples for the
green team. In response, TSMC is now giving higher priority
to Nvidia over its other clients such as Qualcomm and AMD
for the 28 nm fabrication process."
- WCCFtech.com (05/10/12)
Which, curiously, is something Qualcomm had also done before:
"This situation with Nvidia is mirrored by Qualcomm, which
managed to gain priority earlier with the same tactic of
outsourcing orders to gain more fab time."
- LegitReviews.com (05/09/12)
This means the other TSMC 28 nm customers like Broadcom, TI and AMD aren't
going to be too happy plus this last comment directly above about Qualcomm
and the earlier UMC/Qualcomm quote implies that gaining 28 nm "priority"
at TSMC is still not enough -- which, interestingly Forbes magazine has
just confirmed with an article yesterday titled:
Qualcomm Crumbles Under Supply Chain Issues But Concerns Are Overblown
"Qualcomm's shares have been falling ever since it announced its
Q2 FY2012 results last month. While the results for the quarter
were solid, supply chain issues for its 28 nm chipsets caused
Qualcomm to give a subdued forecast for the next quarter.
As a result, Qualcomm's shares have since fallen by close to 15% in
less than a month. ...
Qualcomm expects its operating expenses to increase in the near-term
as it tries to facilitate the production of additional 28 nm chipsets
at fabs not run by TSMC, its current manufacturing partner, to
augment supply."
- Forbes.com (05/23/12)
If getting TSMC priority got this for Qualcomm, what will it do for Nvidia?
- John Cooley
DeepChip.com Holliston, MA
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
Related articles:
"TSMC meets less than 70% of 28 nm chip demand at present"
After 14 weeks, TSMC now finally admits it has 28 nm problems
Chip designers confused/angered by terse TSMC 28 nm response
Clueless TSMC Exec invokes 40 nm fiasco to explain 28 nm yields!
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