In recent years, TSMC’s largest customer has always been Apple. Apple’s huge orders for mobile processors have supported TSMC’s investment and research and development in advanced manufacturing processes.Starting with the mass-produced 3nm process, Intel may also become one of TSMC’s major customers.
The CEO of Intel came to Taiwan to visit customers in December last year. The source said that cooperation with TSMC was one of the key points, but the two sides did not announce the details of the talks.
It is rumored that Intel will not only become one of TSMC’s first 3nm process customers, and share the first batch of 3nm process production capacity with Apple, but TSMC agrees to Intel’s request to build a 3nm process factory for Intel alone, and arrange a separate team to serve the Intel generation. This will separate Intel from the 3nm process production of companies such as Apple.
In addition, the cooperation between the two parties is not short-term. After the 3nm process, they will continue to cooperate until the 2nm GAA process, at least until 2025.
The cooperation plan between the two parties has not yet been officially announced, but at yesterday’s legal meeting, TSMC President Wei Zhejia talked about the principle of cooperation with Intel. He said that he cooperated with IDM Semiconductor in an open and fair manner, and the IDM factory was also one of TSMC’s customers. TSMC has made relevant considerations in capital expenditure, and TSMC will not be overly dependent on a single customer and a single product.
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