Foundries about to enter a golden age

Globalfoundries will remain golden while all around is dark

Globalfoundries CEO Sanjay Jha claims that the semiconductor industry will enter a golden age in the next decade.

Jha claims that this will all be driven by robust chip and memory demand for ultra-large data centres and artificial intelligence (AI).

To make much dosh, the chipmakers will have to provide sufficient manufacturing capacity and corresponding technologies to support future applications, Jha said.

For IC foundries, future applications for AI and Big Data provide the best opportunity to move forward. He said that China is also looking to transform from a manufacturing-based economy to one that focuses on innovation in AI and other new applications.

To deal with all this Golden Age lark, Globalfoundries is speeding up the construction of a new 12-inch fab in Chengdu, China.

The fab is scheduled to begin production of mainstream process technologies in 2018, and will focus on manufacturing Globalfoundries’ commercially available 22FDX process technology with volume production expected to start in 2019, Jha said.

Gloflo announced the availability of its 7nm leading-performance (7LP) FinFET semiconductor technology designed for applications such as premium mobile processors, cloud servers and networking infrastructure.

The first customer products based on the technology are expected to launch in the first half of 2018, with volume production ramping in the second half of 2018.