As Globalfoundries withdraws from the R&D of process 7nm and below indefinitely, only , Intel , TSMC and Samsung are the only ones in the world that are capable of developing advanced processes. The progress of TSMC's new process is accelerating. It is estimated that the market share of 7 nanometers is close to 100%, far higher than 80% to 85% of the market share of 12/16/28 nanometers. In addition, 5-nanometer mass production begins in 2020, which far leaves competitors behind. Intel has officially announced in the first quarter of this year that it will postpone the 10-nanometer product from 2018 to 2019, and it is expected to launch a new 10-nanometer CPU in the second half of 2019. Samsung mentioned in the recently held 2018 wafer foundry technology forum that it will be put into production of 7 nanometers in the second half of 2018 as planned. The key IP is already under development and will be completed in the first half of 2019.
Figure 1
At present, TSMC has dominated the 7nm process node and has won large orders from many large customers. Some media reported that TSMC's latest InFO technology has been recognized by Apple, allowing it to obtain orders to manufacture A12 processor for the iPhone 2 released this year. In addition, in the second half of the year, TSMC will also produce new chips for more than ten customers including Huawei , Qualcomm , AMD, NVIDIA, etc. TSMC's wafer foundry market share rose to 56% last year.
TSMC invests huge R&D and capital expenditure every year, breaking the competition between , UMC, and GF at 28 nanometers, and surpassing Samsung at 16 nanometers, and then surpassing Intel at 7 nanometers, leading the world's foundry. In addition, TSMC's enhanced 7nm process will also be trial-production this year, and 5nm process will be trial-production in 2019. It can be said that TSMC's process technology will still rank as a leading position.
Figure 2
Market analyst Brett Simpson said in an interview recently: "As long as TSMC can provide some new technologies every year and continue to ensure yield, it will continue to become the exclusive supplier of A-series processors in the next few years." Given that Samsung has delivered a large amount of hardware to Apple, Apple would rather stick to using TSMC's products to diversify its supply chain. TSMC recently confirmed that the company plans to invest $25 billion to mass-produce 5nm chips by 2020, so it is likely that Apple will continue to rely on the chip maker for the foreseeable future.
Figure 3
In addition, Apple launched a new iPhone smartphone, of which the A12 processor is exclusively supplied by TSMC with integrated fan-out packaging (InFO), driving a significant increase in the capacity utilization rate of Longtan Advanced Packaging Factory . The industry pointed out that TSMC Longtan Advanced Packaging Factory is the base camp of InFO, with its main customer being Apple, with an estimated monthly production capacity of nearly 100,000 pieces, and its capacity utilization rate was less than 50% at the beginning of this year. However, since the third quarter, it has benefited from the launch of new iPhone phones, and its capacity utilization rate has risen to more than 80%. With the minuscule process, TSMC has developed packaging technology on its own, which has greatly reduced the packaging thickness of mobile phone processor by more than 30%, and has also won orders for three generations of Apple. High-end wafer foundry process combined with advanced packaging will be TSMC's strengths to serve customers.
