This might be a dumb question, but why can't these specialized technologies be moved to smaller nodes? Yes, the shrink might not be much compared to logic, but there's bound to be some transistors and/or other elements inside of the designs that could see benefits and the demand for more products and smaller ones is there.
Because whatever benefits there might be, it won't be considered to be worth the cost to the manufacturers of products (at scale of say, car makers) so the demand won't be there for the foreseeable.
A lot of these specialized technologies are either:
1) such small circuits that a shrink is pointless - i.e. they are pad/pin limited 2) they are something like power or RF ICs where the transistors don't scale and even if they do the wires won't (especially in the case of power ICs) 3) the sell for so little (at least in normal times) that it would take a thousand years to pay back the cost of the N5 mask sets...how you going to make the numbers work for something that sells for 25 cents?
Analog is very difficult to scale, some IC's simply wouldn't benefit from the transistor scaling offered by newer nodes.
Mature nodes also have their own benefits in terms of being very well understood (And therefore having predictable properties), being faster and easier to tape out, generally more reliable, etc...
There is a cost to redesign for a node shrink, but also the cost of the product on a newer node can be more expensive than on an older node.
TSMC needs to invest more and more each new node, so the cost per mm can increase, even though the number of mm decreases. So a 14nm chip could be cheaper than a die-shrunk 10nm or 7nm of the same.
The smaller nodes are completely booked. The demand is over 100%, so to land to these is impossible. It's the same reason AMD is using dual nodes: they can produce more overall chips. Now, if you wanted to make RAM on the smallest nodes, TSMC just wouldn't be able to fill that order for years, because bigger and wealthier clients would outbid you. If you notice the article talks about chips for cars also. Well recently there was a shortage that lasted over a year. Tl/dr: the demand for the smallest nodes is much much higher than the capacity.
I've been to Tainan, Kaohsiung and Hsinchu, beautiful places to hop off and on from the high speed train. But isn't it kinda risky for TSMC to put all their most advanced factories so close together? There was a hurricane 2 years ago that knocked out the refineries in Texas for like a week spiking gas prices in the USA for a week. If something happens in a much smaller area it would spike prices for the entire world for months.
Typhoons, earthquakes, power outages are already annual events. Sure there's some supply chain efficiency having everything together but seems the planet is trying to test us lately...
Some old nodes have to be retained for hardened chips used in space, possibly also for bit flip resistance on Earth, and possibly also for enterprise+ MLC NAND that won't decay rapidly.
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11 Comments
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ballsystemlord - Thursday, June 16, 2022 - link
This might be a dumb question, but why can't these specialized technologies be moved to smaller nodes?Yes, the shrink might not be much compared to logic, but there's bound to be some transistors and/or other elements inside of the designs that could see benefits and the demand for more products and smaller ones is there.
BushLin - Thursday, June 16, 2022 - link
Because whatever benefits there might be, it won't be considered to be worth the cost to the manufacturers of products (at scale of say, car makers) so the demand won't be there for the foreseeable.gdansk - Thursday, June 16, 2022 - link
Imagine that some of these are designs being brought over from old nodes like 90nm, 65nm.Doug_S - Friday, June 17, 2022 - link
A lot of these specialized technologies are either:1) such small circuits that a shrink is pointless - i.e. they are pad/pin limited
2) they are something like power or RF ICs where the transistors don't scale and even if they do the wires won't (especially in the case of power ICs)
3) the sell for so little (at least in normal times) that it would take a thousand years to pay back the cost of the N5 mask sets...how you going to make the numbers work for something that sells for 25 cents?
Wereweeb - Friday, June 17, 2022 - link
Analog is very difficult to scale, some IC's simply wouldn't benefit from the transistor scaling offered by newer nodes.Mature nodes also have their own benefits in terms of being very well understood (And therefore having predictable properties), being faster and easier to tape out, generally more reliable, etc...
See also: "If it works don't fix it"
Lonyo - Sunday, June 19, 2022 - link
There is a cost to redesign for a node shrink, but also the cost of the product on a newer node can be more expensive than on an older node.TSMC needs to invest more and more each new node, so the cost per mm can increase, even though the number of mm decreases. So a 14nm chip could be cheaper than a die-shrunk 10nm or 7nm of the same.
andychow - Sunday, June 19, 2022 - link
The smaller nodes are completely booked. The demand is over 100%, so to land to these is impossible. It's the same reason AMD is using dual nodes: they can produce more overall chips.Now, if you wanted to make RAM on the smallest nodes, TSMC just wouldn't be able to fill that order for years, because bigger and wealthier clients would outbid you.
If you notice the article talks about chips for cars also. Well recently there was a shortage that lasted over a year.
Tl/dr: the demand for the smallest nodes is much much higher than the capacity.
webdoctors - Friday, June 17, 2022 - link
I've been to Tainan, Kaohsiung and Hsinchu, beautiful places to hop off and on from the high speed train. But isn't it kinda risky for TSMC to put all their most advanced factories so close together? There was a hurricane 2 years ago that knocked out the refineries in Texas for like a week spiking gas prices in the USA for a week. If something happens in a much smaller area it would spike prices for the entire world for months.Typhoons, earthquakes, power outages are already annual events. Sure there's some supply chain efficiency having everything together but seems the planet is trying to test us lately...
nandnandnand - Friday, June 17, 2022 - link
Hurricanes, yeah, that's one reason not to put fabs in Taiwan. There may be other reasons.Leeea - Sunday, June 19, 2022 - link
Putting all these Fabs in Taiwan also gives the rest of the world a motivation to make sure all these wonderful Fabs keep functioning.I do not know about you, but I like refrigeration, so it seems to be working for them.
Oxford Guy - Tuesday, July 12, 2022 - link
Some old nodes have to be retained for hardened chips used in space, possibly also for bit flip resistance on Earth, and possibly also for enterprise+ MLC NAND that won't decay rapidly.