Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) plans to begin production with its A14 fabrication process in 2028, aiming to remain at the cutting edge of the chip industry.
The technology would advance the world’s biggest chipmaker beyond its current state-of-the-art 3-nanometer technology and the upcoming 2-nanometer process later this year. In a change of nomenclature, TSMC also plans an intermediary A16 chip process for late next year.
Taiwan’s most valuable company has kept up a steady pace of upgrades that has seen it corral Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp’s most lucrative chipmaking business.
Photo: REUTERS
The company plans about US$40 billion in capital expenditures this year, and its top executives have said its long-term plans are still geared to capture strong artificial intelligence (AI)-driven demand.
At a company event in California on Wednesday, executives laid out the new addition to TSMC’s road map, and detailed how it would help improve power efficiency and performance.
Deputy cochief operating officer Kevin Zhang (張曉強) said he sees an industry shift afoot: Where smartphone component makers used to be the first adopters of new production technology, the boom in AI has made designers of larger AI chips more willing to jump to the latest innovation sooner.
TSMC remains confident that overall demand for semiconductors would continue to rise and total industry revenue would “easily” exceed US$1 trillion by the end of the decade, Zhang said.
While that is a sales target the chip industry has largely embraced, investor anxiety about an AI bubble has grown in the past few weeks with the announcement of wide-ranging tariffs by the US.
A significant advancement from TSMC’s industry-leading 2-nanometer process technology, the A14 logic process technology is designed to drive AI transformation “by delivering faster computing and greater power efficiency,” the company said in a statement.
That is one of a slew of advanced technologies at its annual North America Technology Symposium in California, with a focus on its next-generation AI chips.
TSMC chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) hosted the opening ceremony in Santa Clara for the company’s flagship customer event of the year, which drew registrations from more than 2,500 attendees.
Additional reporting by CNA
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