1. Zhang Zhongmou: TSMC 5nm plant to continue Moore's law;
Set a micro-mesh news, TSMC recently held its wafer 18 factory 5nm groundbreaking ceremony. TSMC chairman Zhang Zhongmou said TSMC 5nm fab to start, a move that represents TSMC's continued support for Moore's Law, as well as deep plowing Taiwan's Determined, more symbolic TSMC to enter the next milestone.
Zhang Zhongmou pointed out that the 5nm plant represents the three layers of meaning for TSMC, the first layer of meaning is TSMC's commitment to continue to push forward; the second layer of meaning is TSMC's commitment to future growth goals, the current 5nm capital investment About 500 billion Taiwan dollars or so, to put this 500 billion investment income, the first estimate must earn 1.5 trillion revenue in five years, which Zhang Zhongmou confidence and said that the next five years, TSMC revenue is expected to have 5 to 10% (in US dollars) rapid growth.
TSMC expects 5nm will enter mass production in 2020, when TSMC will be the first 5nm producers. The future is not only built in the 5nm Nanke, as the industry's demand for extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography if thirsty , Followed by 3nm will also be building in the South Branch.
Zhang Zhongmou said that he thanked the government for its support and assistance in supplying such resources as hydropower and land, so that TSMC could not only base itself on Taiwan but serve the world, but also lead the enterprises in the entire supply chain to a world-class level.
2.Intel CPU latest road map big exposure: 14nm is still the flagship in 2018;
The latest CPU roadmap for Intel was finalized on CB on February 14, 2018. 2018 to 2019: Coffee Lake is the focus of Cascade Lake-SP launch in Q3 As can be seen from the first figure, the server / data center segment , The Xeon Xeon, the E3 series will come out in Q2 2018 (the E3 1200 v7 has been renamed the Xeon E) and the top-of-the-range scalable platform will be updated to the Cascade Lake-SP architecture to differentiate itself from desktop x86.
Mobile platform: i7-8850H / i5-8400H launched in the second quarter
H end of the model is used for the laptop platform standard products, thermal design power 45W, we can see, want to buy the top game this can be started after the spring.
Specifications, i7-8850H will be 6 core 12 threads, clocked at 2.6GHz, accelerating to 4.3GHz; and i5-8400H is a 4-core 8-thread, clocked at 2.5GHz, acceleration also pulled up to 4.2GHz.
Desktop desktop
More 8 generations of Core models will debut in late April, including but not limited to Core i7 / i5 / i3, there are a small amount of Pentium, Celeron and so on.
Enterprise
Cascade-Lake SP is equivalent to Purley Refresh, bringing some new features, such as the instruction set for neural network functions, frequency upgrade, etc. Fast Technology
3. China is still not ratified, Toshiba Semiconductor or raise the price of 4 billion US dollars;
Netease Technology News February 14, according to foreign media reports, it is more likely that Toshiba will miss the deadline for the sale of its memory chip business in March this is undoubtedly the Japanese giant is undoubtedly Good news, because the result may be that the chip business will raise the price of at least 4 billion US dollars.
The company agreed to sell the premium asset division to a consortium led by Bain Capital to avoid the company's stock being delisted after it suffered billions of dollars in losses on its nuclear business, but according to informed sources, China The deal has not yet been approved and the Chinese government regulators are unlikely to review the results before the deadline of March 31. This may give Toshiba a chance to negotiate more favorable terms by adding 2 trillion yen 18.6 billion US dollars) sales price increase, that the price may be undervalued by the Toshibagels billions of dollars.Compared with the second half of last year, Toshiba is now in a more stable state.
Damian Thong, a science and technology analyst at Macquarie Group Ltd in Tokyo, said there is no timetable for China to review Toshiba's chip sales and it seems unlikely that a censorship result will be released by the deadline.
Toshiba spokeswoman Midori Hara said the company is trying to complete the sale by the deadline March 31. Bain Capital declined to comment.
Toshiba reserves the right to terminate the transaction if it can not be completed by March 31. Although the company was in a hurry to raise funds last year, it now no longer needs the funds to avoid a delisting and the company's executives now consider it to be " Grace's deal is well below market, and Toshiba may face inquiries on the issue Wednesday when it announces its quarterly earnings.
The current sale terms are the result of a frenzied negotiation over eight months, with Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. and Broadcom Ltd. bidding 2.5 trillion yen or more Of the acquisition bid, but subsequently gave up the acquisition plan under political resistance.Finally, by defending the legal challenge from Toshiba manufacturing partner West Digital Corp. and won the support of Toshiba's most important customer Apple, Bain Capital won the bid, with people familiar with the matter claiming that the chip division of Toshiba may receive $ 22 billion to $ 24 billion in public auctions.
Toshiba has seen a turnaround in conditions since the transaction was put into negotiation, boosting its capital by selling 410 billion yen of nuclear assets and issuing 600 billion yen of new shares in December. At the same time, the company Memory chip business has become more valuable, the business in the first half operating profit of 205 billion yen, accounting for about 88% of the company's total operating profit.
'They really have no reason to sell this business anymore, only the contract has been signed,' said Hideki Yasuda, an analyst at Ace Research Institute. 'From the point of view of the shareholder, this chip business is left inside the company Is the best solution. '
If the current deal is abolished, Toshiba has at least three options. Toshiba to raise prices to negotiate with the Bain Capital consortium; Toshiba can make the memory chip companies listed to raise funds and to increase their visibility; or to retain the business, the use of Its steady profits financed investment.
Any changes will involve a large group of stakeholders, and insiders said Sumitomo Mitsui and Mizuho Financial Group Inc., Toshiba's major lenders, will play a key role in any decision and will not Easily change their support for the current terms of the transaction.The two banks also promised to provide 600 billion yen in loans to the acquired entity if the transaction was approved by a Chinese regulatory body.Margley Group's Damian Tong Said that while the renegotiation of the terms or the listing of the business may bring higher returns, the bank's primary interest is to reduce the negative risks.
The increase in new shareholders of Toshiba may make it more powerful to support the renegotiation of the deal, and these new shareholders play a more active role in Toshiba's affairs, and the issuance of new shares last December brought the total number of funds holding Toshiba shares to 60 Home, a total of one-third of Toshiba holding equity, these funds include David Einhorn's Greenlight Capital, Daniel Leeb (Daniel Loeb) Third Point and Effissimo Capital Management Pte.
Toshiba, an investor involved in equity financing in December last year, said through renegotiations, Toshiba may add value 200 billion yen.Operators who asked not to be named revealed that investors plan to use the Toshiba shareholders meeting scheduled for the end of June to come Promote better deals.
'Their impact is limited because they are not powerful agents,' said Damien Tong of the Macquarie Group, 'but some of the voices of shareholders may be on the side of internal opponents to increase the deal's completion Difficulty. '(Tianmenshan)
4.EUV lithography: the progress and challenges co-exist;
Although a leading chip maker has said it will introduce extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUVL) into commercial production beginning this year, there are still unresolved issues that will affect the remaining chipmakers' adoption of EUVL at the fab ; These issues include scanner uptime (mainly related to light sources), lack of actinic patterned mask inspection tools, and preparation of EUV mask pellicles .
The 250W light source and the corresponding mask are almost ready for scanners with throughput of 125 wafers per hour and I expect to see a 90% increase in normal operation of high-throughput EUVL scanners this year; It should accelerate the adoption of EUVL by other chip makers.
The commercialization of resists is a major challenge for EUVL applications in the future. EUV photoresists, which are secondary electrons, are completely different from the current photoresists, We need to figure out the crux of the problem and solve the problems of random printing failures and micro-bridging found last year.
At EUV wavelengths, stochastic effects become important; in addition to needing a fuller understanding of the secondary electron dynamics, we also need to address nanomaterial material inhomogeneity issues with mass-produced EUV photoresists; For more than five years we've seen some pretty good new photoresist developments in the lab, but we need to actually see commercial solutions that are as good as lab results.
There is also a need to compensate for commercial tooling gaps used in photolithographic reticle inspection; now reticle inspection tools are increasingly used to detect reticle defects, but at high cost and inefficiency. The reticle inspection technology itself Need to evolve toward smaller wavelengths beyond 193 nm to provide better resolution in future generations; the new EUV light source and associated optics are expected to play a major role in this regard.
I expect that there will soon be suppliers that offer alternatives to the commercial photolithographic EUV mask detection that will use 13.5-nm plasma sources or high harmonic generation (HHG ).
I'm not sure what the current design and materials will be able to extend all the way to a 500W source for the reticle, but I believe the reticle design must evolve; I now see that the source voltage may reach 500W in the future, but I'm not sure what Technology provides over 500W of power - tin (Sn) laser plasma (LPP) or Free Electron Laser (FEL).
The design of the membrane will be accompanied by the evolution of new materials, the challenge will be to test and integrate the best technology options into the scanner; E-beam inspection will benefit, but optical detection will continue to improve beyond 193 nm Its resolution and maintain the mainstream status.
ASML shipped 10 EUV scanners in 2017 and is expected to double shipments by 2018. Someone asked me if scanner optical components or mask blanks will be shipped The number of bottlenecks that have doubled each year since 2018? I expect there will be some challenges in the supply chain as EUVL rolls into production, but so far no particular noteworthy situation has been seen.
Of the vendors, foundry GlobalFoundries has risen in terms of manufacturing power, size of investment and progress in EUVL technology development, with excellent technology and manufacturing teams, and I expect them to steadily expand their wafer generations Business layout, and ready to import EUVL technology in the fab.
Compile: Judith Cheng
(Source: EUV Milestones, Challenges Ahead, by Vivek Bakshi; The writer is president of technology consultant EUV Litho) eettaiwan
5.2018 Taiwan semiconductor packaging and testing industry output growth of about 4 ~ 5%
Taiwan's IC packaging and testing industry is still actively seeking the main force of growth in 2018, are familiar with the IC packaging and testing industry bluntly, a large number of smart phone-related communication chips, the end of the first half of the end-user for the economy also hold a conservative wait and see attitude, Apple (Apple), Android two Camp are still not sure, the visibility of IC packaging and testing industry is still under observation.But the long-term view, 5G, artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT) and other trends remain unchanged, the second quarter of operation is expected to start warming, Six months, the growth momentum brought by new applications will be gradually fermented, and according to research institutes such as ITRI estimated that IC packaging and testing industry output growth this year, fell within the 4 ~ 5% of the slight growth. According to ITRI estimates that Taiwan's IC packaging industry output this year is expected to increase by 4.5%, the output value of about NT $ 348 billion, the test industry is estimated at an annual increase of 4.2%, the output value is expected to come to 150 billion yuan. The industry said that this year the exchange rate is still unsolved problems.In addition, the price pressure from the mainland IC packaging and testing plant is still in the first half, the mainland mobile phone brands for the market outlook is also temporarily unknown, it is estimated MWC 2018 exhibition is expected to have More new machine published this year, mainland products Card shuffling effect will continue, the current main players include Huawei, Oppo, Vivo, millet, Lenovo and storm sound in Africa etc. Taiwan's IC packaging and testing industry has completed a large-scale integration, ASE and silicon were passed at the extraordinary shareholders meeting Combination of the case, the new moon and light investment company, is expected to set up in the second quarter is expected both sides stopped trading on April 17, listing, and ASUS cast on April 30 listing. ASE Group voted to control the first Dong Supervisor, Chairman Lin Wenbo of Silicon Products and General Manager Kevin Chieh were elected as the representatives of Hong Kong Merchants Microelectronics under ASE, representing Silverstone as a member of ASE Group. The first board of ASE Casting elected 11 directors, 3 supervisors, The Directors include 8 representatives of Hong Kong Merchants Microelectronics International Co., Ltd., namely Zhang Pensheng, Lin Wenbo, Cai Qiwen, Wu Tianyu, Dong Hongsi, Luo Ruirong, Chen Changyi and Chen Tianci, and 3 individuals including Zhang Hongben, Zhang Nengjie and Liu Shiliang respectively. As Zhang Pangsheng, vice chairman of Zhang Hongben. 3 overseers are Zheng Tianzheng, Feng Yuanquan, Chen Fangying. ASE Wu Tian Yu, former chairman of the group quarterly growth is thrown tone It is estimated that operating results are expected to soar from the second quarter of 2018. System-in-package SiP, automotive electronics, high-speed computing, various types of MEMS, sensors, power components and more will be provided Memory integrated chip SiP package for this year's revenue, profit growth, ASE deep confidence. ASE capital spending this year, the amount will not be lower than last year, revenue, profit growth are expected to grow.