GlobalFoundries Stops All 7nm Development: Opts To Focus on Specialized Processes
by Anton Shilov & Ian Cutress on August 27, 2018 4:01 PM EST- Posted in
- Semiconductors
- CPUs
- AMD
- GlobalFoundries
- 7nm
- 7LP
GlobalFoundries Press Release
GlobalFoundries Reshapes Technology Portfolio to Intensify Focus on Growing Demand for Differentiated Offerings
Semiconductor manufacturer realigns leading-edge roadmap to meet client need and establishes wholly-owned subsidiary to design custom ASICs.
Santa Clara, Calif., August 27, 2018 – GLOBALFOUNDRIES today announced an important step in its transformation, continuing the trajectory launched with the appointment of Tom Caulfield as CEO earlier this year. In line with the strategic direction Caulfield has articulated, GF is reshaping its technology portfolio to intensify its focus on delivering truly differentiated offerings for clients in high-growth markets.
GF is realigning its leading-edge FinFET roadmap to serve the next wave of clients that will adopt the technology in the coming years. The company will shift development resources to make its 14/12nm FinFET platform more relevant to these clients, delivering a range of innovative IP and features including RF, embedded memory, low power and more. To support this transition, GF is putting its 7nm FinFET program on hold indefinitely and restructuring its research and development teams to support its enhanced portfolio initiatives. This will require a workforce reduction, however a significant number of top technologists will be redeployed on 14/12nm FinFET derivatives and other differentiated offerings.
“Demand for semiconductors has never been higher, and clients are asking us to play an ever-increasing role in enabling tomorrow’s technology innovations,” Caulfield said. “The vast majority of today’s fabless customers are looking to get more value out of each technology generation to leverage the substantial investments required to design into each technology node. Essentially, these nodes are transitioning to design platforms serving multiple waves of applications, giving each node greater longevity. This industry dynamic has resulted in fewer fabless clients designing into the outer limits of Moore’s Law. We are shifting our resources and focus by doubling down on our investments in differentiated technologies across our entire portfolio that are most relevant to our clients in growing market segments.”
In addition, to better leverage GF’s strong heritage and significant investments in ASIC design and IP, the company is establishing its ASIC business as a wholly-owned subsidiary, independent from the foundry business. A relevant ASIC business requires continued access to leading-edge technology. This independent ASIC entity will provide clients with access to alternative foundry options at 7nm and beyond, while allowing the ASIC business to engage with a broader set of clients, especially the growing number of systems companies that need ASIC capabilities and more manufacturing scale than GF can provide alone.
GF is intensifying investment in areas where it has clear differentiation and adds true value for clients, with an emphasis on delivering feature-rich offerings across its portfolio. This includes continued focus on its FDXTM platform, leading RF offerings (including RF SOI and high-performance SiGe), analog/mixed signal, and other technologies designed for a growing number of applications that require low power, real-time connectivity, and on-board intelligence. GF is uniquely positioned to serve this burgeoning market for “connected intelligence,” with strong demand in new areas such as autonomous driving, IoT and the global transition to 5G.
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Alexvrb - Tuesday, August 28, 2018 - link
LOL let's bring Fujitsu into an argument as a good example of how to win... LMAO. How's Fujitsu doing in the fab biz, again?NuclearArmament - Tuesday, August 28, 2018 - link
More companies would do better by having their own fabs, not less. Being vertically integrated via either merger, acquisition, or organic means is a much better way to remain competitive than solely remaining fabless and outsourcing. Intel is only as large as they are in the semiconductor world because they did not so foolishly sell off all their fabrication facilities like AMD did.FunBunny2 - Tuesday, August 28, 2018 - link
"More companies would do better by having their own fabs, not less. "I've always been puzzled about how much scale there really is. ASML (and who else?) supply the fundamental equipment that all fabs use. did ASMl/whoever figure out, say EUV, and supply all the fabs; or did Samsung, say, figure it out and ASML/whoever built the machines to Samsung/whoever's spec?? from the picture of fabs I've seen, it looks very much like some number of sequential, discrete work-stations, repeated X times. it's not like a car assembly line, where one line makes all the cars.
mikato - Tuesday, August 28, 2018 - link
Yeah I noticed that too. The first photo makes it look like there are a bunch of semi-mobile machines arranged in groups forming the stations. Then the next photo might be more of an assembly line - at least it has a bunch of overhead tracks for things to move along, not sure what, maybe transporting items around.RSAUser - Tuesday, August 28, 2018 - link
It wasn't foolish for AMD to sell, TSMC is a lot cheaper for them than global while being on a better node ans AMD not having the money to invest in smaller nodes.Going TSMC they are at least mostly competitive in the node portion of the cards.
Spunjji - Tuesday, August 28, 2018 - link
You're either trolling or a fool to suggest that selling the fabs was a bad idea for AMD. For a company of that size they're nothing but a millstone. They limited their output capacity when AMD actually had good processors to sell, and then cost them billions when they didn't have a competitive product.The stupid bit was the agreement to produce a minimum number of wafer stars with GF after they sold the fabs. That bit them hard in the financials.
FullmetalTitan - Thursday, August 30, 2018 - link
Smart guy over here figured out the secret to business success in semiconductors if you ignore...*checks notes*
...the need for decades of R&D and many 10s of billions of dollars to acquire companies to supply goods, design products, and leverage talent.
gglaw - Sunday, December 16, 2018 - link
LOLOL. Yea AMD is doing horrible since they sold off their outdated fabs and are paying less for superior nodes now. Their stocks have just plummeted in the last few years. The investors are super pissed that their $3 stocks have gone up to $20 since they don't run their own fabs (which btw is on their own way down the drain after sinking billions into 7nm R&D and scrapping it to focus on old nodes). Look at AMD's balance sheets, then look at TSMC or Samsung. It's 1B vs FIVE HUNDRED BILLION cash on hand. AMD is a tiny designer of fancy chips compared to massive semi-conductor firms that produce chips for the whole world. Even Intel is a speck compared to these companies and more than a few analysts feel Intel's best future move is also letting TSMC use their much deeper pockets to compete in bleeding edge node wars. (If you haven't noticed, Intel is getting the shit kicked out of them in node advancement.)gglaw - Sunday, December 16, 2018 - link
The savings from vertical integration is absolutely nothing compared to the R&D costs and ramping up manufacturing facilities for each new node. Even if the vertical integration made the wafers literally free, it would forever run AMD in the red trying to pay for the R&D and new facilities for a tiny fraction of the chips sold required to justify the cost of each node advancement. AMD would have to sell over 100X the amount of chips they did in 2018 to maintain a fab that could keep up with TSMC and Samsung. TSMC can do it since they sell a staggering amount of chips compared to either AMD or Intel. AMD accounts for under 1% of TSMC's contracted chips produced. In the tech enthusiast world, AMD is very exciting since they play such a large roll in gaming hardware design but in the business world, they're a little ant.transistortechnologist - Tuesday, August 28, 2018 - link
It turns out that at very small dimensions compound semiconductors such indium gallium arsenide do not offer any benefits over silicon. It's fundamental, in the physics, quite apart from any economic considerations.