Samsung to ramp up 5nm production to avoid losing orders for flagship Snapdragon 875 processor and X60 modem
Samsung is expected to ramp up the power of its 5nm process in an effort to keep TSMC from outsourcing large customers like Qualcomm. New 5nm production facilities will be launched before the end of this year.
It is reported that the loading of Samsung’s 5nm lines is mainly provided by Qualcomm Snapdragon 875 chips and a Snapdragon X60 modem, as well as Samsung’s proprietary Exynos 1000 single-chip system. Before that, there was news about problems with Samsung’s 5nm process technology. So there was every reason to believe that for insurance purposes Qualcomm will transfer all or part of the orders for the new processors to TSMC.
Last month, it was reported that Qualcomm turned to TSMC for emergency assistance, hoping that the latter could produce X60 modems and Snapdragon 875 processors due to some problems with Samsung’s 5nm process. According to Qualcomm’s previous plan, the Snapdragon 875 chips were mainly supposed to be printed by Samsung.
This is not the first time such news has been heard. But at present, TSMC’s 5nm manufacturing facility is extremely busy. First of all, they are given under the seal of Apple A14 and the new Kirin 9000 chip from Huawei (from September 15, TSMC will sever all relations with Huawei, but until then it continues to print chips).
Earlier, DigiTimes reported that Samsung’s 5nm EUV process was again in trouble. In addition, it was stated that the yield of suitable crystals does not meet expectations and this will affect the launch of Qualcomm Snapdragon 875 and Snapdragon 735G.
The Snapdragon 875 is expected to feature a combination of Cortex-X1 and Cortex-A78 super cores for the first time. The new X1 core is 30% more energy efficient than the A77 and 23% more efficient than the A78. It is also better optimized for machine learning tasks than the A78. Qualcomm is expected to integrate a 5G modem into the flagship Snapdragon 875 SoC for the first time.
Samsung announced the development of its 5nm process last year and began investing in rolling out production lines earlier this year. However, the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted plans. To speed up production, the South Korean company added a new 5nm casting line a couple of months ago at a factory in the South Korean city of Pyeongtaek.
