5nm chip design costs may reach as high as $250 million

Source: Content compiled from eettaiwan and fast technology, thank you.

According to eetimes, TSMC has announced the production of its first N7+ process node chip using partial extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) technology, and will begin risk production of a 5nm process using full EUV in April next year.

According to TSMC's updated data, its advanced process nodes continue to improve in terms of area and power, but chip speeds can no longer advance at their historical speed. To compensate for this, TSMC has updated the six packaging technologies it is developing to accelerate chip-to-chip interconnection.

In addition, TSMC has collaborated with four industry partners including Cadence to jointly support online services for back-end chip design. Supporters say cloud-based services will shorten time and expand the range of chip design tools, helping to expand the semiconductor industry, which is facing a slowdown in Moore's Law. However, they also point out that cloud design is still in the early stages of requiring the setting and optimization of custom platforms.

In terms of process technology, TSMC announced that it will use the N7+ process node to produce customer chips, which uses EUV that can process 4 layers of masks. Its N5 EUV can be improved to process up to 14 layers of masks and will be ready for risk trial production in April next year. EUV technology is expected to reduce the number of masks required for advanced designs, thereby reducing costs.

TSMC said that based on tests using the Arm A72 core, the N5 chip will bring a 14.7% to 17.7% speed increase and a 1.8% to 1.86% reduction in footprint. The N7+ process node can reduce power by 6% to 12% and increase density by 20%. However, TSMC did not mention how much the speed of N7+ can be increased.

Currently, chip designs based on the N5 technology node have been enabled, but most EDA tools will not reach the availability of version 0.9 until at least November this year. Many of TSMC's basic IP blocks are ready for N5, but some specifications including PCIe Gen 4 and USB 3.1 may not be in place until June next year.

The N7+ technology node uses tighter metal line spacing and includes a single-fin library that helps reduce dynamic power. An automotive design version will also be launched in April next year. Hou Yongqing, vice general manager of TSMC's research and development/design and technology platform, said that N7+ provides "almost the same analog performance as N7."

TSMC said that the transistor density of N7 is 16.8 times higher than the foundry's 40nm node. Unfortunately, the cost of more advanced processes is also rising. According to one of the sources, the total cost of N5 design, including labor and IP licensing fees, is about $200 million to $250 million, a significant increase from the current $150 million required for 7nm chips.

The proportion of 7nm will continue to rise

As the leader in the foundry industry, TSMC's 7nm process is in full swing. Even with the impact of factors such as the Sino-US trade war, the decline in mining demand, and the sluggish sales of smartphones, 7nm will help TSMC achieve record revenue in the third quarter and continue to create new highs in the fourth quarter.

At the same time, despite rumors that Apple has cut some A12 processor orders, TSMC still expects that by next year, more than 100 chips based on 7nm and 7nm EUV extreme ultraviolet lithography processes will be taped out, more than doubling the 50 chips this year, including major customers such as Huawei Kirin, Qualcomm, AMD, NVIDIA, and Xillinx.

Therefore, TSMC is very optimistic about the prospects of 7nm process in the next few years, and it is expected that the related annual revenue can reach 10-12 billion US dollars stably, contributing more than 20% of TSMC's wafer revenue in the fourth quarter of this year, and the proportion for the whole year can be close to 10%, and it can exceed 20% for the whole year of next year. . TSMC emphasized that the four major platforms of mobile devices, high-speed computing computers, automotive semiconductors and the Internet of Things will all grow next year. Among them, mobile device chips, which account for 50% of revenue, have negative revenue growth this year, but will regain strong growth momentum next year, and the annual growth rate is estimated to be close to 10% or even exceed 10%; the other three major platforms will also grow in double digits like this year. The company is confident that the annual revenue growth rate can be maintained at 5% to 10% in the next five years.

VIS, which is held by TSMC, is also full of confidence, mainly due to the strong demand for 2K/4K large-size battery driver ICs, discrete power components, power management ICs, etc.

However, due to the turbulent global economic and financial environment, TSMC and VIS are relatively conservative about their revenue for next year.

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