Problems with the 10-nm process technology continue to ruin Intel’s plans, and 7 nm wait a long time
Intel’s management has repeatedly promised in public that within the framework of 7-nm technology it will be able to return to the usual frequency of lithographic technology changes – once every two or two and a half years. The debut of the computing accelerator Ponte Vecchio, which will be the first-born in the 7-nm process technology, is scheduled for the very end of 2021. The mass production of 7-nm Intel products will not be able to start before 2022.
As a famous journalist Charlie Demerjian admitted during a Susquehanna news conference, Intel continues to be plagued by problems with the development of a 10-nm process technology. The mobile processors Tiger Lake, which will enter the market in the near future, fit only four cores on the chip, since the graphics core turned out to be quite large and “eaten up” the affordable transistor budget. To make the crystal larger did not work out for economic reasons, so I had to limit the number of processing cores to four, which nowadays someone may already miss.
Ice Lake-SP server processors, although they will be presented at the very end of this year, will not be available in massive quantities until March next year, according to a source. An additional delay is caused by the need to fix current vulnerabilities in the field of information security. Their successors in the face of 10-nm processors Sapphire Rapids will also be delayed at the stage of preparation for mass production, as the number of preliminary revisions will be increased. Although recently Intel representatives assured that they would introduce Sapphire Rapids processors in the next year and a half, one should not count on the beginning of mass deliveries before the first half of 2022.
The beginning of the life cycle of 7-nm Granite Rapids processors will also shift, even if you do not take into account the difficulties associated with the development of a new lithographic technology. Since both Ice Lake-SP and Sapphire Rapids may enter the market later than originally planned, Granite Rapids processors will also have to make room. They will come to the market no earlier than 2023, according to the source. At the same time, AMD Milan processors in terms of performance in single-threaded applications are reported to be able to circumvent competing Intel solutions already at the beginning of next year, and delays in future server products can have rather sad consequences for the microprocessor giant.
Separately, the reason for leaving Intel Jim Keller (Jim Keller), who a couple of years ago was invited to the company to develop promising processor architectures, is separately mentioned. According to Charlie Demerdzhyan, Keller insisted on more active use of the production potential of TSMC, because of which he had a conflict with the management, which ultimately caused his dismissal from the company. Intel does not hide the fact that more than 20% of revenue comes from products that are issued by third-party contract manufacturers, but these are either specialized solutions or sets of system logic. Intel has still tried to release central processors on its own. Keller, apparently, “swung at the sacred,” after which he was forced to leave.
