Intel to Reclaim Number One Semiconductor Supplier Ranking in 2019

According to IC Insights, Intel is to reclaim the number one semiconductor supplier ranking in 2019 from Samsung due to the downturn in Memory (DRAM and NAND). The top 3 memory suppliers (Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron) are according to IC Insights forecast to register ≥29% year-over-year declines in 2018 with SK Hynix expected to decline the most by a 38% down in sales 2019.

The expected top 15 semiconductor (IC and O-S-D—optoelectronic, sensor, and discrete) sales ranking for 2019 is shown above.  It includes six suppliers headquartered in the U.S., three in Europe, two each in South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan.

Source: IC Insights (LINK)

US-China Trade War—DRAM Price to Drop Further 15%

US-China Trade War—DRAM Price to Drop Further 15%: DRAMeXchange, tech market intelligence firm TrendForce's memory and storage branch, announced that it expects Huawei's blacklisting by the U.S. government to contribute to a DRAM price drop of up to 15% in the third quarter. The DRAM market has already struggled amid falling demand, inventory surpluses, and other problems. 

 

Those problems have led to steady price drops throughout 2018 and the first half of 2019. Memory companies have already felt the sting of these price drops--Samsung even ceded the semiconductor throne to Intel in May because its profits had dropped so much in recent quarters. Losing Huawei as a customer is expected to make things worse.

 

 

Source: Tom´s Hardware LINK

 

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By Abhishekkumar Thakur

Highlights of Samsung Foundry Forum 2019, Santa Clara, California, USA

3nm Gate-All-Around (GAA) process, 3GAE, development is on track. Process Design Kit (PDK) version 0.1 for 3GAE has been released in April to help customers get an early start on the design work and enable improved design competitiveness along with reduced turnaround time (TAT).

Compared to 7nm technology, Samsung’s 3GAE process is designed to provide up to a 45 percent reduction in chip area with 50 percent lower power consumption or 35 percent higher performance.

Samsung Electronics launched the Samsung Advanced Foundry Ecosystem Cloud (SAFE™-Cloud) program. It will provide customers with a more flexible design environment through collaboration with major public cloud service providers, such as Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure, as well as leading Electronic Design Automation (EDA) companies, including Cadence and Synopsys.

Samsung’s roadmap includes four FinFET-based processes from 7nm down to 4nm that leverage extreme ultraviolet (EUV) technology as well as 3nm GAA, or MBCFET™. In the 2H of this year, Samsung is scheduled to start the mass production of 6nm process devices and complete the development of 4nm process. The product design of Samsung’s 5nm FinFET process, which was developed in April, is expected to be completed in the 2H of this year and go under mass production in the 1H of 2020.

 

While FinFET structures must modulate the number of fins in a discrete way, MBCFET™ provides greater design flexibility by controlling the nanosheet width. In addition, MBCFET™’s compatibility with FinFET processes means the two can share the same manufacturing technology and equipment, which accelerates process development and production ramp-up. (Samsung.com)
 

Development of the successor to the 28FDS process, 18FDS, and eMRAM with 1Gb capacity will be finished this year.

Source: Samsung (LINK)

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By Abishekkumar Thakur and Jonas Sundqvist

Samsung Electronics to build new foundry in Pyeongtaek

Samsung Electronics recently announced its "Semiconductor Vision 2030". As part of it, they will construct a new foundry in Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi-do. The present foundry fab, located in Giheung and Hwasung, will expand to Pyeongtaek, which is the world's most extensive semiconductor production base. Until now, Samsung Electronics' Pyeongtaek campus had only a memory production for DRAM and NAND, but with this investment decision, the Pyeongtaek will become a base for foundry logic as well. Currently, Samsung Electronics has a foundry fab that produces system semiconductors in Austin, Texas, USA, and in Giheung, Hwaseong, Gyeonggi-do.

 

Samsung refers to GAA as a 4-dimensional technology in their marketing pitch. (News 1 Korea)

 

The "Semiconductor Vision 2030" goal for Samsung Electronics is to become the world's No. 1 semiconductor maker in 2030, and investment in the foundry market will be in full swing to secure economies of scale.

The cost (more than 20 trillion won) to build this new EUV fab equals to building three Incheon airports according to Samsung Electronics and will be ramped with a 3 nm process. Whereas the new Hwasung fab new plant is scheduled to start operation 2020 ramping 7 nm, 5 nm, and 4 nm. As of 5 nm, the transistor architecture will be transferring from current FinFET technology GAA-FETs (Gate-All-Around FETs). 

 

Source: News1 Korea (LINK)

Samsung Electronics will maintain its DRAM production volume

Samsung Electronics will maintain its production volume without reducing memory semiconductors such as DRAMs. This is a different strategy than the second and third largest memory semiconductor makers SK Hynix and Micron announced their plans to cut production. According to Samsung Electronics, the semiconductor market is expected to improve from the second half of the year as early as 3Q, and it has been said that it does not cut production for preemptive countermeasures.

• SK Hynix, the second-ranked maker, also announced that it will reduce its NAND flash wafer input this year by more than 10 percent from its 1Q earnings release. 
• Micron has announce that it will cut DRAM and NAND flash by 5% each to resolve supply-demand imbalances and inventory problems last month. 

Source: www.asiae.co.kr LINK

 

Samsung Electronics also announced last week that it will invest 133 trillion won in memory and non-memory semiconductors by 2030 (LINK). 

 

 

The investment plan is expected to help the company to reach its goal of becoming the world leader in not only memory semiconductors but also logic chips by 2030. The company also plans to create 15,000 jobs in R&D and production to bolster its technological prowess. (Source: Samsung)

Samsung doubles investment in EUV line at Hwaseong plant

Samsung is preparing to double its previous investment in a contract related to its new EUV lines at the company's Hwaseong facilities. Samsung announced construction plans for Hwaseong in 2017, and broke ground in 2018 with completion scheduled for 2020. Samsung added 739 billion won to the original 723 billion won contract, signed back in September 2018, bringing its total value to around $1.29 billion. The work for this particular line is expected to be completed by April 2020.

Source: Techspot LINK
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Bay Abhishekkumar Thakur

Semiconductor Foundry Landscape

Semiconductor Foundry Landscape Update 2019 by Daniel Nenni [SemiWiki]

The semiconductor foundry landscape changed in 2018 when GLOBALFOUNDRIES and Intel paused their leading edge foundry efforts. Intel quietly told partners they would no longer pursue the foundry business and GF publicly shut down their 7nm process development and pivoted towards existing process nodes while trimming headcount and repositioning assets.

"Today there are only two leading edge foundries left, TSMC and Samsung. TSMC is currently the foundry market leader and I see that increasing when mature CMOS process nodes that have second, third, and even fourth sources become obsolete and the unclonable FinFET processes take over the mature nodes."

 

Countinue reading: LINK 

 

 

Samsung’s GAA Transistor, MBCFET™ aims at Reduced Size and Increased Performance

While chipmakers are struggling with the FinFET based chip production below 5 nm process nodes, Samsung has planned to opt for GAA (gate all around) architecture. Samsung’s GAA redesigns the transistor, making it more power-efficient and better-performing than the existing Multi Bridge Channel FET (MBCFET™) that utilize stacked nanosheets. 

Samsung’s patented MBCFET™ is formed as a nanosheet, allowing for a larger current and simpler device integration. It allows to reduce the operating voltage below 0.75 V that had been extremely difficult with FinFET. This yields to 50% less power consumption or 30% more performance at 45% less chip area compared to 7 nm FinFET technology. Also, Samsung's GAA technology is compatible with current FinFET production line that means the today's fab running on mature process tools and methodology can be utilized for GAA transistors. Here is the infographic to learn more about how Samsung’s GAA is advancing the future of semiconductor technology.

Source: Samsung LINK

Written by : Abhishekkumar Thakur and Jonas Sundqvist

Samsung has started production of its first embedded MRAM using 28 nm FD-SOI

[MRAM-Info] Samsung announced that it has started to mass produce its first embedded MRAM, made using the company's 28nm FD-SOI process. Samsung says that its eMRAM memory module offers higher performance and endurance when compared to eFlash, and can be integrated into existing chips.

 

Source: MRAM-Info LINK

 

 

Chipmakers to scale up 96-layer 3D NAND flash output in 2Q19

The global output of 96-layer 3DNAND flash memory is set to expand starting the second quarter of 2019. NAND flash prices have been falling since 2018, due mainly to an increase in the supply of 64- and 72-layer 3D NAND chips. The memory prices even fell to a record low of under US$0.10 per gigabyte at the end of the year. 

 

Major chipmakers have moved to slow down their capacity expansion pace aiming to stop NAND flash memory prices from falling further. However, improvement in their new-generation 96-layer 3D NAND production yield rates will still result in supply-side growth. Samsung is set to enter mass production with its 96-layer 3D NAND 512GB UFS 3.0 solutions. Samsung also has plans to roll out 1TB solutions in the 2H 2019. 

 

Toshiba has rolled out recently its new-generation 96-layer 3D NAND SSD and UFS 3.0 solutions, while Micron has introduced a new SSD series based on 96-layer TLC 3D NAND technology and developed 96-layer QLC NAND technology for 1TB devices, with volume production slated for 2Q 2019. 

 

Source: DigiTimes Chipmakers to scale up 96-layer 3D NAND flash output in 2Q19 LINK

 

  

 

Samsung capacities up to 1TB will be available from today, with the 2TB model launching in April. Pricing for that part has not yet been announced, however it is likely to be at a similar price density per GB as the 1TB. (Anandtech LINK)

Nvidia may manufacture its 2020 GPUs using Samsung’s 7nm EUV process

According to a new report from a Japanese news source, Nvidia will manufacture its 2020 GPUs using Samsung’s 7nm EUV process. Nvidia is currently using TSMC’s 12nm process for its latest GPU cards. 

In a previous report by DigiTimes, Nvidia was rumored to use TSMC’s non-EUV 7nm process for its cards in 2019, but that may no longer be the case if Nvidia plans to use Samsung’s 7nm EUV process in 2020. It’s possible Nvidia could use TSMC’s 7nm process in 2019 for some of its products and Samsung’s 7nm EUV for others in 2020, but that may not make too much practical sense, as it would make its product line-up complicated to design.

Source: Tom´s Hardware  LINK

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By Abhishekkumar Thakur

Top-3 memory chipmakers combined DRAM revenues hit record high in 3Q/201818

The world's top-3 memory IC vendors - Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix and Micron Technology - saw their combined DRAM and flash memory revenues climb to a record high of US$37.3 billion in the third quarter of 2018.

The combined revenues for third-quarter 2018 represented increases of 8% sequentially and 36% on year, thanks mainly to demand for servers and smartphones that come with higher density memory specs.

DRAM chip sales accounted for as high as 71% of the combined memory chip revenues generated by the top-3 vendors in the third quarter of 2018, Digitimes Research indicated. The top-3 memory chip vendors saw their combined DRAM memory sales reach US$26.4 billion in the third quarter, up 10% sequentially.

Source: DIGITIMES LINK