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yalanand
@Attoman I agree with you that there is real challenge in process development. I ...
SiliconAsia
I guess EEtimes also likes to have an oil money so can't say anything bad!!
GlobalFoundries charts road to 14 nm
Rick Merritt
8/30/2011 11:00 AM EDT
Separately, GlobalFoundries taped out its first 20-nm test chip. The company aims to make a planar process available in high performance and low power versions with first production tape outs anticipated in the fourth quarter of 2012.
Bartlett said the planar process will provide finer scaling and use fewer layers of double patterned 193-nm immersion lithography than Intel's 22-nm tri-gate transistor announced earlier this year. "We think our process provides the right balance for mobile systems that are concerned with performance, power and cost," he said.
Looking farther down the road, GlobalFoundries has ordered an ASML 3300 extreme ultraviolet lithography machine to be delivered to its New York fab at the end of 2012. It will try to prove out the EUV technology in a late version of the 20-nm node, but the company doesn't expect EUV to be required until the 14-nm node.
In packaging, customers will demand new kinds of 3-D chip stacks late in the 28-nm node or early in the 20-nm node, Bartlett predicted. Big graphics and networking chips will demand 3-D chip stacks using interposers. Mobile apps processors want 3-D stacks using through silicon vias, he said.
"The market is beginning to crystallize around certain subsets where system designers want to have that capability in hand," he said. But "the supply chain is nearly as complex as the technical solutions" for advanced 3-D ICs, he added.
Thus GlobalFoundries struck a co-development agreement in advanced packaging with Amkor Technology. It expects to strike similar deals with other companies to create a broader alliance of packaging partners.
Meanwhile Manocha said he is making it his top priority to get close to customers to develop reference accounts GlobalFoundries can talk about publicly. Manocha has not yet met the new chief executive of his biggest customer, Rory Read, named to head AMD last week.
GlobalFoundries has no acquisition plans on the table at this point, Manocha said. However it does have a team of 30 people in Abu Dhabi studying the feasibility of building a fab there someday, a goal of ATIC.
"We have identified a location for the fab near the airport, so the question is when not if and the when part has not been addressed yet—it depends on how the business grows," he said.
"The Abu Dhabi leadership decided to diversify its [oil] economy, and make semiconductors the seed for other high tech industries that will mushroom out of it into areas such as solar panels and LEDs," Manocha said.
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Robotics Developer
8/30/2011 1:00 PM EDT
It is nice to see the roadmap! I wonder what the future holds for the processes beyond 14nm? The concept of a 3Ghz dual core ARM 9 is really appealing. Just for now I will have to wait...
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Attoman
8/30/2011 4:33 PM EDT
There is a real challenge in process development and control of 3D and sub-22nm structures and patterns. Metrology roadmaps have identified the need for 3D microscopy of 40 to one and better depth to width measurement and imaging which is not avaiable today.
Perhaps ATIC should consider world leadership in this critical area.
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yalanand
9/5/2011 6:16 AM EDT
@Attoman I agree with you that there is real challenge in process development. I feel leakage will be biggest gating facotr. I am not sure if high-K dielectric will solve all the leakage problems at 14nm.
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gutiea
8/30/2011 8:38 PM EDT
Has the company presented a roadmap for making money or at least not bleeding their soul out? That would be roadmap that would shock the world; roadmaps based on dreams, delays and losses are hardly worth discussing.
Keep the losses WELL hidden from the Abu Dhabians, we might be able to rebalance energy trade on account of them!
Good job GloFo, make up those mammoth operating losses on wafer volume! :-(
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SiliconAsia
8/30/2011 11:52 PM EDT
You got the point!
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Archeologist
8/31/2011 5:15 AM EDT
It is not a bad deal if Abu Dabi keeps unemployment in semiconductor industry low in USA and Germany
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wilber_xbox
8/31/2011 10:30 AM EDT
yeah, its surprising to read only the future roadmap. Do you know how well they fair quarterly?
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SiliconAsia
9/4/2011 1:50 PM EDT
I presume they don't have much to say about how well they fair quarterly or entire year. We will soon know by AMD announcement how many 32nm is being shipped if it is being shipped at all.
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resistion
8/30/2011 8:40 PM EDT
If they already made the jump to DP at 20 nm, they will re-use that at 14 nm. EUV is already late for their 14 nm development.
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greenpattern
8/31/2011 5:02 AM EDT
If graphics and networking require different packaging from mobile, it's a totally different game from just silicon, and Global has virtually no control in this aspect.
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Archeologist
8/31/2011 5:10 AM EDT
AMD is better of counting on TSMC than GF roadmap on paper
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docdivakar
8/31/2011 6:51 PM EDT
@Rick Merritt: it was good to meet with you again at GloFlo's conference.
In the afternoon tracks, I sat in the manufacturing track and got some good info on their packaging and MEMS plans. I am not how ever sold on the fab-less model for large volume MEMS which is still an IDM play led by ST & TI.
@greenpattern: you are some what partially correct. The gray-shaded area is like this: if there is backend fab activity (like flipchip, RDL, Si interposers) in a product, then the options are wide open, a fab like GloFlo can get that action though packaging houses can also play. But being upstream in that flow gives fabs an advantage.
Dr. MP Divakar
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greenpattern
8/31/2011 8:37 PM EDT
@Dr. Divakar: what I mean is, the packaging houses are holding the cards, rather than the silicon foundries.
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docdivakar
9/1/2011 12:00 PM EDT
@greenpattern: I agree... how ever, in the evolving 3D stacked IC ecosystem, even though packaging houses hold the cards, the business model is not yet clear as to who 'owns' the yield issues! So far, 3DIC via stacking has been a niche play for a few companies but its real growth can come from fabless design houses who can productize the technology with applications (of which software is a big part of innovation). When that happens, who do they engage first? Foundries or the packaging houses, or both? The last one may be the obvious choice but my hunch is not many fabs or packaging houses are willing to give a minute of their work day to an ASIC startup or small companies.
Foundries like GloFo, if they want to spur product innovation, can certainly do a lot more by leveraging their partnerships they just announced with Amkor.
MP Divakar
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help.fulguy
8/31/2011 7:49 PM EDT
Hey Rick, Come On. Where are the tough questions? Did you ask about the yield on 32nm? Did you just take their answer that they are done with 32nm! Why cant you ask the tough questions like an honest journalist would do! EETimes is becoming more of a PR company than a Technical oriented company! What the heck is going on with Llano supply issue? Is it an issue with their process? Whats with Bulldozer delay? Come on.
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SiliconAsia
9/4/2011 1:53 PM EDT
I guess EEtimes also likes to have an oil money so can't say anything bad!!
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