In the latest news, the Taiwanese Semiconductor Manufacturing Company has introduced its new N4P process, which is a performance-focused enhancement of the foundry’s 5nm technology platform.
This will be the third major enhancement of TSMC’s 5nm family, and according to sources, N4P is set to deliver an 11% performance boost over the original N5 technology and a 6% boost over N4. Compared to N5, N4P will also deliver a 22% improvement in power efficiency and will also bear a 6% improvement in transistor density.
N4P is also set to lower process complexity as well as improve wafer cycle time and it does it all by reducing the number of masks. The N4P process by TSMC was first designed for easy migration of 5nm platform-based products, enabling customers to not only better maximize their investment but to also deliver faster and more power-efficient refreshes to their N5 products.
The new N4P designs will also be well-supported by TSMC’s comprehensive design ecosystem for silicon IP and EDA and TSMC stated that the company along with its Open Innovation Platform partners will help to accelerate the product development cycle.
TSMC further stated that the first products based on N4P technology are expected to be tapped out by the second half of 2022.
“With N4P, TSMC strengthens our portfolio of advanced logic semiconductor technologies, each with its unique blend of performance, power efficiency, and cost. N4P was optimized to provide a further enhanced advanced technology platform for both HPC and mobile applications,” said Kevin Zhang, senior VP of business development at TSMC. “Between all the variants of N5, N4, and N3 technologies, our customers will have the ultimate flexibility and unmatched choice of the best mix of attributes for their products.”
