NXP joins TSMC's 5nm capacity competition
28 August 2023
Recently, NXP Semiconductors (NXP) and TSMC announced a cooperation agreement, NXP's next-generation high-performance automotive platform will use TSMC's 5 nm process (N5P). This collaboration combines NXP’s automotive design expertise with TSMC’s 5nm process to further drive the transformation of automobiles into powerful computing systems on the road; NXP and TSMC are expected to deliver the first batch of 5nm process samples to NXP’s major customers in 2021.
Based on multiple successful designs of the two parties' cooperation in the 16nm process, TSMC and NXP expanded the scope of cooperation to create a 5nm system-on-chip (SoC) platform for next-generation automotive processors. By adopting TSMC's 5 nm process, NXP products will address a variety of functions and workload requirements, including connected cockpits, high-performance domain controllers, autonomous driving, advanced networks, hybrid propulsion control and integrated chassis Integrated chassis management.
TSMC's 5 nm process technology is currently the world's most advanced mass production process. NXP will use TSMC's 5 nm powerful version process (N5P). Compared with the previous generation 7nm process, its speed is increased by about 20%, power consumption is reduced by about 40%, and it has the industry's most complete design ecosystem support.
NXP's 5 nm R&D is initially based on the already constructed S32 architecture, which will become a new architecture with a scalable and universal software environment, which will further simplify and greatly improve software performance to meet future automotive needs.
TSMC 5nm is about to be mass-produced, and this year's order has been booked by Apple and Huawei HiSilicon. Major customers including Qualcomm, MediaTek, Broadcom, AMD, Nvidia, Xilinx and others have already started 5nm chip design, and it is expected to enter the mass production stage in the next two years.
In the second half of this year, TSMC 5nm gradually entered the stage of mass production, mainly for Apple's foundry A14 application processor, and for Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 1000 series 5G mobile phone processor.
This year there are only two major customers, Apple and Huawei, but in 2021 and 2022, with the maturity of TSMC's 5nm process and the increase in production capacity, several other large customers who will queue up will also enter the market. For example, Qualcomm's new 5G mobile phone chip Snapdragon 875 and X60 baseband chip, Nvidia's next-generation Hopper architecture GPU chip, AMD's Zen 4 architecture CPU, and RDNA 3 architecture GPU will also use TSMC 5nm production. In addition, the industry is rumored that Intel will also become a TSMC 5nm customer.
In addition, in 2021, Apple's A15 application processor, Huawei HiSilicon will launch the Kirin 1100 next year, and its latest server AI and Arm chips, will also use TSMC's 5nm process technology. Of course, the upgraded version of the 5nm process will be used in 2021, and production capacity will also increase significantly.
In addition to TSMC, Samsung is another manufacturer capable of mass production of 5nm. Recently, the company announced its mass production of 5nm, and grabbed orders from Qualcomm and Nvidia. However, the industry generally believes that Samsung's wafer foundry's 5nm production capacity and yield will still be difficult to catch up with TSMC in the second half of the year. TSMC is confident to be the only wafer foundry that can provide 5nm volume production this year.
Based on multiple successful designs of the two parties' cooperation in the 16nm process, TSMC and NXP expanded the scope of cooperation to create a 5nm system-on-chip (SoC) platform for next-generation automotive processors. By adopting TSMC's 5 nm process, NXP products will address a variety of functions and workload requirements, including connected cockpits, high-performance domain controllers, autonomous driving, advanced networks, hybrid propulsion control and integrated chassis Integrated chassis management.
TSMC's 5 nm process technology is currently the world's most advanced mass production process. NXP will use TSMC's 5 nm powerful version process (N5P). Compared with the previous generation 7nm process, its speed is increased by about 20%, power consumption is reduced by about 40%, and it has the industry's most complete design ecosystem support.
NXP's 5 nm R&D is initially based on the already constructed S32 architecture, which will become a new architecture with a scalable and universal software environment, which will further simplify and greatly improve software performance to meet future automotive needs.
TSMC 5nm is about to be mass-produced, and this year's order has been booked by Apple and Huawei HiSilicon. Major customers including Qualcomm, MediaTek, Broadcom, AMD, Nvidia, Xilinx and others have already started 5nm chip design, and it is expected to enter the mass production stage in the next two years.
In the second half of this year, TSMC 5nm gradually entered the stage of mass production, mainly for Apple's foundry A14 application processor, and for Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 1000 series 5G mobile phone processor.
This year there are only two major customers, Apple and Huawei, but in 2021 and 2022, with the maturity of TSMC's 5nm process and the increase in production capacity, several other large customers who will queue up will also enter the market. For example, Qualcomm's new 5G mobile phone chip Snapdragon 875 and X60 baseband chip, Nvidia's next-generation Hopper architecture GPU chip, AMD's Zen 4 architecture CPU, and RDNA 3 architecture GPU will also use TSMC 5nm production. In addition, the industry is rumored that Intel will also become a TSMC 5nm customer.
In addition, in 2021, Apple's A15 application processor, Huawei HiSilicon will launch the Kirin 1100 next year, and its latest server AI and Arm chips, will also use TSMC's 5nm process technology. Of course, the upgraded version of the 5nm process will be used in 2021, and production capacity will also increase significantly.
In addition to TSMC, Samsung is another manufacturer capable of mass production of 5nm. Recently, the company announced its mass production of 5nm, and grabbed orders from Qualcomm and Nvidia. However, the industry generally believes that Samsung's wafer foundry's 5nm production capacity and yield will still be difficult to catch up with TSMC in the second half of the year. TSMC is confident to be the only wafer foundry that can provide 5nm volume production this year.
