18-inch wafer foundry process likely to delay to 2018
Josephine Lien, Taipei; Steve Shen, DIGITIMES [Thursday 12 June 2014]
The arrival of the era of 18-inch wafer foundry processes may not come until 2018 as Intel reportedly has slowed down the development of 18-inch wafers, while semiconductor equipment supplier ASML has also temporarily discontinued development of production equipment for 18-inch wafers, according to industry sources.
Intel together with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) and Samsung Electronics are currently the world's top-three semiconductor companies that are able to foray into the production of 18-inch wafers, but attitudes at the three companies are varied.
Intel pioneered in the development of 8- and 12-inch wafers, but may not rush to migrate to production on 18-inch wafers as it has missed out on the explosive growth experienced by the mobile communication industry recently, the sources noted.
Samsung, being the largest supplier of DRAM and NAND flash chips, will be most eager to move into the 18-inch wafer segment as larger wafers would significantly help trim down production costs for memory chips, added the sources.
Samsung also eyes to manufacture NAND flash chips on 18-inch wafers using a 10nm or below processes so that it can significantly reduce its production costs for SSDs, the sources added.
The development of 18-inch wafers is also included in TSMC's roadmap as the Taiwan-based foundry house has already drawn up plans to develop 16nm, 10nm and 7nm processes after taking the leading position in the 28nm and 20nm segments, noted the sources.
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