TSMC to make 3nm chips for Intel: Reports

A new major development related to the American multinational corporation and technology company, Intel, has surfaced online. As per the report from Digitimes, Intel has given Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) an outsourcing contract for manufacturing 3nm chips.

According to Digitimes, and according to sources among suppliers, Intel’s upcoming chips designed with a 3nm process will go into mass production in the second half of 2022. The agreements have already been negotiated and the teams of the Californian- based firm have already visited the southern Taiwan production site of TSMC to prepare the ground. And the orders would be of considerable importance since the publication claims that Intel will then become TSMC’s second-largest customer, behind Apple.

Earlier, it was reported that Intel is exploring the possibility of outsourcing some of its high-end chipset manufacturing and has been in talks with TSMC and Samsung. While the report claims that an agreement has been reached with TSMC, talks with Samsung are in the preliminary stage.

The semiconductor market that is worth over $4 trillion sees Intel as one of its big players and the American company is valued at around $230 billion. But it seems that the U.S tech giant is losing its grip over the market and competitors have taken the approach of designing chips and outsourcing productions to third-party manufacturers.

The likes AMD and NVIDIA are giving stiff competition to Intel. The American company sees its position in the market at risk as both these competitors look to make acquisitions to hold a larger part of the market. AMD has acquired Xiling for $35 billion and NVIDIA recently announced the acquisition of ARM for $40 billion.

Intel has been seen struggling in the computer chipset market for some time despite being the leader of the market. The finger was pointed at the CEO for the poor performance and the company announced the appointment of current VMWare CEO Pat Gelsinger who will take control next month.

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