SINGAPORE — Malaysian foundry Silterra has put expansion plans on hold while it weighs a potential decision to leapfrog the 90-nanometer node and directly develop 65-nm capacity, CEO Eg Kah Yee told EE Times in a March 19 interview.
Many of Silterra's clients in the consumer space continue to focus on cost, rather than performance, and thus are still designing for 0.18-, 0.16- and 0.13-micron processes, Eg said. But there are already indications that customers like Broadcom are determined to bypass the 90-nm node altogether, he said.
"Sixty-five-nanometer equipment is about the same cost as 90-nm," he said. "That's a big, big problem for foundries right now.
'There's a tendency for a lot of the design houses to skip that 90-nm node; because the foundry cost is about the same, the belief is that [90 nm] won't be competitive if we make [90-nm and 65-nm capacity] available at the same time."
Ultimately, Eg said, Silterra's decision "is going to be driven by customers. Right now, we have started the work on 90 nm, and we will probably do 65 nm fairly soon so that we have the capability in both technologies.
"Should the customers move to 90, then we'll build capacity there; if we see the trend is to hop over to 65, then we'll look at 65."
Eg estimated Silterra has "easily the next nine to 12 months to make that decision."
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