Intel has just reported on its fourth quarter earnings earlier today (22nd January 2021). In the report, the company noted a strong quarter and a record year, while also promising an update on its 7nm process.

The known chip maker stated that it has apparently fixed its 7nm process but still plans on outsourcing some plans, as per a TomsHardware report. Intel is planning to contract out the production of some of its leading edge products. Previously, we had reported on team blue outsourcing the production of its Core i3 processors to TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker. Furthermore, Intel’s upcoming CEO Pat Gelsinger added that he has personally reviewed the progress of the updated 7nm process.

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The senior executive said that he was pleased with the “health and recovery of the 7nm program.” He further added that Intel will be using external foundries for some of its products. The upcoming CEO is also confident that the majority of the company’s 2023 CPU products will mostly be from its own factories. Further plans regarding production will be unveiled at a later date, after Gelsinger takes the lead in February 2021.

Notably, Intel has also noted great performance in its mobile chips that are found in laptops. Thanks to affordable notebooks, the company’s PC business saw a significant rise of 33 percent year on year in the fourth quarter of last year. During this time, the average price of notebooks dropped by 15 percent, which further helped boost the sales of laptops with Intel chips, as per an Engadget report. The bump in sales was also backed by the pandemic that made remote working and online education the new norm as well.

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In the 26th Technology Symposium, TSMC unveiled the details regarding its 7nm N7 process, 5nm N5 process, N4, and 3nm N3 process. The world’s largest contract chipmaker also introduced its latest 3DFrabric technology and hinted at what lay beyond the 3nm process node.

TSMC has already been leading the semiconductor industry, which started with it leaving Intel and Samsung behind after shifting to its 7nm process nodes. Since then, the company has also advanced towards the 5nm process, with the development of the 3nm nodes also being on track. In other words, TSMC is showing no signs of slowing its pace, with production for the 3nm process reaching mass production levels by 2022 while Intel’s 7nm is expected to arrive by late 2022 or even early 2023.

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Notably, TSMC’s 5nm ‘N5’ uses the company’s EUV technology “extensively” which brings various improvements over the 7nm N7. According to official notes, the N5 process offers up to 15 percent more performance for the same power consumption as the N7 and even offers up to 30 percent power reduction for the same performance levels as well.

The improvement doesn’t stop there as the N5 also achieves 1.8X logic density gain over the 7nm N7 process. This translates to the defect density learning curve for N5 being faster than N7, meaning the 5nm process will achieve higher yield rates faster. The chipmaker has also enhanced N5P node in development for high performance applications and plans on ramping up production in 2021.

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TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker, has managed to manufacture over 1 billion 7nm chips. This arrives in just a bit over 2 years since it began manufacturing the 7nm process, which is a notable achievement that the company celebrated earlier this week.

The number of chips produced could cover 13 Manhattan city blocks. TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) began production of 7nm chips back in April 2018. Since then, the firm has “manufactured 7nm chips for well over 100 products from dozens of customers.” The customers include big names in the industry like AMD, Apple, Qualcomm, and even Huawei up until September of this year.

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In comparison, Intel, one of the other major chipmakers, has yet to transition into the 7nm process. It has faced various issues in its yield and has delayed the 7nm chips till late 2022 or early 2023. On the other hand, TSMC has already managed to equip each of its 7nm chips with at least one billion transistors inside i. In other words, the company has also managed to make more than one quintillion 7nm transistors as well.

One of the reasons through which TSMC managed to achieve this milestone is its EUV lithography technology that the company introduced with its latest generation. EUV stands for “extreme ultraviolet light” which is used to print on a scale of nanometers. This technology was particularly difficult to introduce to its mass production line, although, it has definitely paid off and the company is already working with 5nm chips as well.

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Earlier today (24th July 2020), Intel revealed its earnings for the second quarter of 2020. During the announcement, the known chipmaker also stated that its 7nm CPUs are being delayed by another 6 months and may now release in late 2022 or early 2023.

The delay now sets back the previously revealed release date, which means that its yields for the 7nm process are now 12 months behind the company’s originally planned roadmap target. In other words, the company is still not able to produce 7nm chips in an “economically viable way,” according to TomsHardware.

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Box Swan, Intel CEO, said that the company had found a “defect mode” in its 7nm process. This caused yield degradation issues, as a result of which, the company had to invest in “contingency plans.” These plans also included third part foundries for its upcoming 7nm Ponte Vecchio GPUs that are the company’s first discrete graphics cards, which the company said will arrive in late 2021 or early 2022; showcasing another delay from the original 2021 launch.

Furthermore, Intel will also be launching its 7nm server CPUs (Granite Rapids)  in 2023 that was originally listed for launch in 2022. This is especially concerning considering its primary rival AMD, has already made the shift to 7nm, and the current Intel roadmap will have Team Red’s EPYC server CPUs shift to 5nm before the end of 2022. Although, Team Blue will be launching the commercial 10nm desktop CPUs (Alder Lake) for laptops and PCs in the second half of 2021.

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AMD has officially announced the new Ryzen 3000XT series of processors. These new chips are refreshed chips of their popular 7nm desktop processors and offer a higher boost clock than the regular versions.

The new chips feature the refreshed Zen 2 architecture that the Ryzen 3000 series is built on. The announcement revealed three new chips, which included the Ryzen 9 3900XT, Ryzen 7 3800XT, and Ryzen 5 3600XT. These are built on a more refined 7nm process, which results in slightly higher performance than the base variant. Despite having slightly higher boost clocks, the overall TDP of these CPUs have remained the same.

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Furthermore, the primary focus of these chips was to improve single threaded performance, which is an area their competition, Intel, generally win at. According to official notes, the Ryzen 9 3900XT offers 4 percent higher performance than the Team Blue’s counterpart, Intel Core i9-10900K. Interestingly, AMD has also announced that the new processors will also be offered at the same retail price as the non-XT chips.

Notably, only the Ryzen 5 3600XT is bundled with a Wraith air cooler, since the company recommends water cooling for both the Ryzen 9 3900XT and Ryzen 7 3700XT. The high end Ryzen 9 3900XT only boasts a 100MHz higher boost clock, which is also reflected with the Ryzen 5 3600XT. On the other hand, the Ryzen 7 3800XT arrives with a 200MHz higher boost clock than the non-XT versions. So while these are great offerings, they aren’t exactly ground breaking improvements over the pre-existing lineup.

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The world’s largest contract chipmaker, TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company), maybe planning on coordinating with various companies like NVIDIA, AMD, Qualcomm and more to shift its production focus towards Huawei chips.

This move arrives after the Chinese company lost its chip supply from TSMC, due to new sanctions being enforced by the US Government. However, 120 days buffer period was also offered for a smooth transition of phasing out Huawei chip orders and completing pending ones as well. Thus, TSMC could be asking other companies to shift their orders, enabling it to ramp up Huawei Kirin chip production and complete the order in time.

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According to reports from Taiwanese media, TSMC may face difficulties to achieve the chip orders for the Chinese smartphone vendors if it doesn’t coordinate with other firms and adjusts its production capacity. Thus, a more focused approach to, what could possibly be Huawei’s final order, maybe a priority order for the semiconductor giant. The former has always been a major customer for TSMC, so the new sanctions will affect both sides.

Earlier this month, a report had claimed that Huawei has placed an additional order worth 700 million US Dollars with TSMC to cover its 7nm and new 5nm chip orders. The latter is for its upcoming flagship Mate 40 series that will launch later this year. Hence, Huawei is reliant on TSMC regarding its 5nm based Kirin 1020 (or reportedly Kirin 1000) SoC. We will be providing more updates regarding this, so stay tuned.

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(Via)

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Huami is one of the top wearable manufacturers in the world today. The company released its first self-developed RISC-V based Huangshan 1 processor last year. While that was a significant feat for Huami, we are hearing that the successor to the wearable-focused chip will be even more impressive. According to the popular leakster Ice Universe, Huami’s Huangshan 1S chip will be manufactured using the advanced 7nm process!

7nm is the manufacturing process used by flagship-grade chipsets of 2019. So it will be really impressive to see if Huangshan 1S is built on the same process. If true, it would make Huami only the second Chinese company to have developed a 7nm chipset after Huawei. This will be a tremendous achievement for the wearable maker who has been releasing a lot of smartwatches lately. What’s more, he says that we could see it inside the Amazfit Sports Watch 3 that’ll launch tomorrow.

At tomorrow’s event, we’ll see at least two new smartwatches from Huami. One will be an Apple Watch killer featuring a similar square-shaped design but with a custom-built high PPI AMOLED display. The second watch will be the successor to the Pace 2 that was announced just a few months back. The watch called the Amazfit Sports Watch 3 or the Pace 3 will feature a transreflective display as its predecessors and NFC. It will even have a special Elite edition featuring a premium titanium body.

For more details on the Apple Watch killer, read this article. The launch is scheduled for tomorrow so we’ll get official details very soon!

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(Source)

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UPDATE: Huawei has confirmed an event for the new Kirin 990 on September 6 at IFA, Berlin.

Last week, Neowin had reported that the upcoming Mate X will feature the new Kirin 990 processor. This essentially revealed the naming of the new processor. And today, Yanming Wang, president of Huawei CEE, Northern Europe, and Canada, confirmed to Techradar that the new flagship-grade processor from Huawei is indeed called as the Kirin 990.

Yanming also confirmed that the Kirin 990 will be built on a 7nm process and will be more power-efficient than its predecessor. He adds that the new chipset will power flagship smartphones from the brand in 2020 and comes with support for all mainstream 5G bands. However, he failed to confirm whether the chip will support mmWave frequencies that are currently being used in the US. We’ll know soon as the chip is said to launch at IFA 2019 in Germany early next month.

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It is also confirmed that the Huawei Mate X will feature this new processor and will come soon. However, according to earlier reports, the phone was said to be delayed to November instead of the earlier predicted September release. So it remains to be seen when the new foldable will actually make it to the market.

Another question that Yanming failed to answer was whether Honor’s 5G smartphone will feature the Kirin 990. There have been reports that MediaTek is working to strike a deal with Huawei for its cheaper 5G phone models. Honor could a very good candidate for MediaTek’s 5G chipsets, so some of its cheaper 5G flagships may not feature Kirin 990 after all.

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(Via)

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Huawei‘s June 21 event is going to be a big one with at least three new smartphones and a new tablet confirmed to arrive but there is another big announcement on that day. A top Huawei executive has just confirmed that the Chinese giant will also unveil its second 7nm chipset on that day.

He Gang, the president of Huawei’s consumer mobile business unit took to Weibo to announce that Huawei will be the first mobile phone company with two 7nm SoC chips. He confirmed that the new SoC will be unveiled in Wuhan on June 21.

While he didn’t reveal the name of the processor, previous leaks have said it is the HiSilicon Kirin 810 processor. The Kirin 810 is the successor to the 12nm Kirin 710 and will appear first in the Nova 5. There isn’t much info about the SoC yet but it is said to be built on TSMC’s 7nm node. It has also been reported to feature Huawei’s own in-house NPU and that the difference in performance between it and the flagship Kirin 980 won’t be too big.

Huawei’s Kirin 810 chipset is set to take on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 700 series. The most powerful Snapdragon 700 series processor at the moment is the Snapdragon 730G and it is an 8nm chipset. The Kirin 810 already has the edge when it comes to power efficiency since it has a smaller node size.

Apart from the Nova 5, the Kirin 810 has also been reported to be the chipset inside the upcoming Honor 9X Pro.

(Source, Via)

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Since Taiwanese chipmaker MediaTek is already out of the high-end chipset market, that segment is expected to be dominated by flagship phones that will be powered by Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 855 chipset. Already, there are indications that Samsung’s next-generation flagship, the Galaxy S10 series will be powered by the new chipset but it won’t be the first phone to have the chip. Xiaomi is also billed to unveil the flagship Mi 9 on February 20, same day Samsung will launch the Galaxy S10 models.

From the Taiwanese supply chain comes the news that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) will soon commence the mass production of the Snapdragon 855 chipset. This is expected to cater for a large number of orders Qualcomm is said to have received from OEMs like Samsung, Xiaomi, LG, Nokia and several others.

The orders from Qualcomm will, no doubt, boost TSMC’s revenue in no distant time. The foundry was already facing a slump in its revenue due to reduction in orders for iPhone chips. The revenue is expected to pick up around July when most of the orders must have been delivered. TSMC projects 2019 to be a slow year for it and the entire semiconductor industry. However, it believes the competitiveness of its 7nm node manufacturing will ensure it still outperforms the industry average.

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The Snapdragon 855 is Qualcomm’s first 7nm chipset and it features a multi-core AI engine which Qualcomm claims to deliver up to three times better AI performance compared to its previous mobile platform, the Snapdragon 845. The new chipset also comes with Computer Vision (CV) ISP for enhanced computational photography which performs the same way as Google’s Night Sight feature for Pixel devices, thus substantially improving imaging in low-light areas.

(source)

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Samsung‘s latest flagship chipset is the Exynos 9820 and it will power the upcoming Galaxy S10 and Galaxy S10 Plus. Going by previous years, the flagship chipset used in the S-series should also power the Galaxy Note released the same year, and in this case – the Galaxy 10/Note X flagship. However, that might not be the case this year.

A post on Weibo by popular leaker Ice Universe revealed that we may get to see the Exynos 9825 in the second half of the year.

Looking at the way the post is framed, this doesn’t seem to mean Samsung’s usual tradition of announcing its next flagship the preceding year just as the Exynos 9820 was announced last year. We believe it means we will see the Exynos 9825 chipset in phones this year and what better phone for it to debut on other than the Galaxy Note 10/Note X?

There isn’t any info on the features of the processor but we think it will be a slight improvement on the Exynos 9820 – probably a higher clockspeed for the GPU and CPU or maybe even its first 7nm chipset since the Exynos 9820 is an 8nm chipset.

READ MORE: Samsung intros Exynos 7904 mobile processor with high-end features for mid-range phones

These are just speculations, so we advise you take it with a pinch of salt. If more details surface, we will be sure to let you know.

(Source)

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Huawei and Apple already beat the other chip makers in the race to announcing and also releasing phones powered by 7nm chipsets with their Kirin 980 and the Bionic A12/A12X proccesors respectively. Now it appears Samsung is ready to claim the third spot.

Samsung’s Exynos Twitter account posted a tweet yesterday with an image that has the text “Intelligence from within” and a November 14, 2018 date written on it. We believe this is a teaser for the launch of the next generation flagship Samsung processor – the Exynos 9820.

Think next. #TheNextExynos pic.twitter.com/e5RNSd1Fx2

— Samsung Exynos (@SamsungExynos) November 9, 2018

The Exynos 9820 will be a 7nm chipset and will first appear in the Galaxy S10 series in the first quarter of 2019 before appearing in the Galaxy Note 10 in the third quarter. The chipset will also have a 5G modem.

There are rumors the Exynos 9820 will have a tri-cluster arrangement like the Kirin 980. One cluster is said to be made of two custom Mongoose M4 cores, followed by a second cluster of Cortex-A76 cores and a third cluster of Cortex-A55 cores. The chipset has also been reported to feature a Mali-G76 GPU and have advanced AI capabilities.

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At the moment, the Bionic A12X is the most-powerful chipset in a mobile device. It will be interesting to see how well the Exynos 9820 performs. Qualcomm, on the other hand, will announce its own next-gen processor at an event in December scheduled to hold in Hawaii.

(Source)

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Are smartphones like computers? Will they be able to replace computers? Well, it won’t be wrong to say that smartphones and computers are running a close race. Smartphones are really close to beating computers and it is, indeed, a tough competition between the two.

If you are wondering whether your next technological purchase should be a smartphone or a computer, then buy smartphones today. You will not regret the decision.

How Are Smartphones Better than Computers

Smartphones are a lot like computers in numerous ways. They are taking over the market and are getting more popular than computers — all for good reasons. The very first advantage smartphones have over computers are they are extremely easy to carry. You can take them with you anywhere and enjoy almost every feature that is offered by a computer — and then some more.

Every smartphone can be connected to the Internet via 3G/4G or Wi-Fi and it supports incredible speeds. Due to the fast internet access, you can perform a number of online activities, regardless of where you are. Social media, office work, online gaming, online shopping, music, movies, etc., are just some of the activities that you can enjoy on your smartphone.

Smartphones prove to be a great companion of workaholics too. There is no need to worry about missing important emails when you are away from the office. You can even make and send presentations and excels on smartphones. It is literally like carrying a computer in your pocket!

Despite being small in size and weighing less, a smartphone is comparable to a computer in terms of RAM, processors and storage.

3 Reasons Why Smartphones are winning

1. Foldable Smartphones

Technological advancements have taken place in displays, allowing them to be flexible.A foldable smartphone looks like a wallet which folds into half, with an image on the outside that you can interact with and you can fold it open for a larger image.

2. 7nm Processor

Companies are rolling out a 7nm processor that delivers faster performance, savesmore power and sports a higher resolution screen and camera. What’s more? It will also support phones with 5G connectivity.

3. Snapdragon 850

The Snapdragon 850 presents insanely speedy performance that gamers and on-the-go binge watchers can spoil themselves with. You can also benefit from features like LTE-connectivity and extended battery life.

Computers Over Smartphones

There are numerous areas where smartphones can beat a computer but it is impossible to deny the computer its rightful spot in certain areas. For example, computers are a common sight in every single office, all over the world. You cannot expect people to work using their smartphones in offices. It is true that people can make excels and presentations on the phones and even send emails, but computers offer a better platform to maintain excels, powerpoint, word doc, etc., as compared to the smartphones.

Additionally, many people prefer typing on a full keyboard that a computer can offer rather than typing on type pads that are only a few inches big. So, when it comes to work, computers are next to irreplaceable. Moreover, the size of the display is perhaps the only one area where a computer will always beat the smartphone.

In Conclusion

The line between a smartphone and computer is getting blurred with each passing day. Several smartphones can perform the tasks of computers such as emailing, writing blog posts, and store information, while computers are able to perform phone-like functions like making a call, sending a text, or finding a phone number.

While it may be impossible to think of smartphones completely replacing the computer in the next few years, there is a high possibility that bridge between the two will keep getting smaller.

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Samsung’s latest chip is the Exynos 9810. At the moment, it can only be found in the international variants of the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+. However, a new finding has revealed that the Korean manufacturer has already begun work on a successor, the Exynos 9820.

The finding comes from an employee’s bio where it is listed under the accomplishment that he/she is working on the Exynos 9820. So not only do we know that the new chip is already under development but we also know its name.

The bio also reveals the individual is involved in the development of a 5G RF chip. While he/she started work on the RF chip back in May, 2017, work began on the Exynos 9820 in January, 2018.

There are no details of the Exynos 9820 available but it will likely be Samsung’s first 7nm chip. It probably will not be officially announced until next year before it appears in the Galaxy S10 or whatever Samsung decides to call its next flagship.

RELATED: Samsung Building New 7nm Foundry, Announces Partnership With Qualcomm for 7nm 5G Chips

Qualcomm is another manufacturer already working on a 7nm 5G chip and mobile processor. Its 5G modem is the Snapdragon X50 and will appear alongside the Snapdragon 855 in mobile phones in 2019.

(Source)

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Samsung’s semi-conductor and foundry business is one of its most profitable ventures. However, it didn’t get into the 7nm race early, leading to Taiwan’s TSMC getting the upper hand.

Samsung wants to play catch up and has announced the building of a new foundry which will use Extreme Ultra Violet (EUV) process for production of 7nm chips.

The new foundry will be located in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi Province, South Korea, and will begin mass production next year.

In a related news, Samsung today announced that its partnership with Qualcomm will be expanded thanks to the new EUV process technology which will be used to manufacture Qualcomm’s 5G mobile chipsets next year.

The EUV process brings a number of advantages for chip production and performance. First, the chip is smaller than previous generation ones which means device manufacturers will be able to design much slimmer devices or increase battery capacities due to the additional space.

Samsung says the process technology also reduces the complexity associated with production and has a greater yield than 10nm FinFET process. Chips produced using the process will also have a 10% increase in performance and a 35% reduction in power consumption.

TSMC on the other hand will still use FinFET for its own 7nm chips. However, its early foray into 7nm production means that it will handle production of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 855 chip.

READ MORE: Samsung Planning To Bring The Full-Screen OLED Design To Its Midrange Segment

By the time Samsung begins its own 7nm production, it should be ready to manufacture the Snapdragon 865 or whatever Qualcomm decides to call the chipset for 2020.

(Sources: 1, 2)

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Samsung won’t be making Qualcomm’s next flagship chip which is the Snapdragon 845. Nevertheless, it isn’t a total loss as it just secured the deal to build 7nm A12 chips for the 2018 iPhone according to The Korea Herald.

This is a big win for Samsung, considering it lost the deal for the Snapdragon 845 to TSMC whom currently makes the 10nm A11 chip for Apple. The reason for losing out on the Qualcomm deal is because it won’t be ready for 7nm production yet by the time Qualcomm needs them.

However, since a new iPhone is usually released in the 3rd quarter, Samsung would have enough time to prepare for production. The Korean electronics giant just purchased some extreme UV machines specifically to make Apple’s 7nm chips. Testing is on-going and will soon be completed. Production will then begin after Apple’s approval.

Samsung used to make chips for Apple before but lost the deal to TSMC in 2013. Now TSMC has Qualcomm, and Samsung has Apple back.

The Qualcomm deal is a loss considering 40% of Samsung Foundry’s sales last year was from the American company. Though there are speculations that Samsung may get deals for mid-range 10nm chips. Some manufacturers may also still release Snapdragon 835 phones next year.

READ MORE: Xiaomi Reportedly Signs Deal With Samsung For 6-inch OLED Panels For Its 2018 Flagship

Samsung will first make 8nm chips before making a complete transition to 7nm. Its next Exynos flagship is expected to be built on the 8nm node.

(Source, via)

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Chip makers Qualcomm and Mediatek announced towards the end of 2016 that their new flagships chips will be built on the 10nm node. However, Intel has announced that it will start trial production of 7nm chips this year.

For decades, Intel has based its chip creation on the words of its co-founder Gordon Moore who said that “the number of transistors incorporated in a chip will approximately double every 24 months”. The statement which is now referred to as Moore’s Law has seen chip manufacturers nearly double the performance and efficiency of a processor roughly every 2 years.

However, they discovered that the law couldn’t be applied  any further during the making of 14nm-based chips as it was pretty difficult to fit more transistors on a smaller area. Now, the interpretation of Moore’s Law has to do with the reduced cost of transistors.

Intel says the 7nm is still in a testing phase and the result from the trial production will help them invest in large factories that can begin to produce chips based on the 7nm technology. They have also announced that they will be returning to the tradition of two new chips per manufacturing cycle instead of three like they did with their 14nm based chips (Broadwell, Skylake, and Kaby Lake).

READ MORE: Intel Compute Cards can Prevent Smart Devices from Becoming Obsolete

The new 7nm chips, apart from being smaller and more energy efficient will also be faster and can also lead to laptops with longer battery life as Intel plans to use new materials such as gallium-nitride.

Intel is not the only one developing 7nm chips. TSMC announced last year it was going to start 7nm trials this year and start taking orders in 2018. Samsung on the other hand announced a week ago that production of its 7nm chips will begin in early 2018.

(Sources: 1 & 2)

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