Intel extends 14nm foundry deal with Altera

EE Times reports Intel and Altera have expanded their year-old foundry deal. Under the new agreement, Altera can use Intel's 14nm FinFET foundry to manufacture multi-die devices that feature Altera's Stratix 10 FPGAs and SoCs with DRAM, SRAM, ASICs, processors, and analog chips in a single package. The original agreement was exclusively for FPGAs.

"Our partnership with Altera to manufacture next-generation FPGAs and SoCs using our 14 nm Tri-Gate process is going exceptionally well," said Sunit Rikhi, vice president and general manager, Intel Custom Foundry, in a press release. "Our close collaboration enables us to work together in many areas related to semiconductor manufacturing and packaging. Together, both companies are building off one another's expertise with the primary focus on building industry-disrupting products."

Altera, based in San Jose, Calif., has been leveraging Intel's manufacturing prowess to give its advanced FPGAs advantages in density, performance, and power over rival FPGA maker Xilinx, which partners with TSMC as its foundry. When the companies announced their partnership a year ago, Altera CEO John Daane said besides winning more business away from Xilinx, the 14 nm parts could help Altera grab more sockets away from ASICs and application-specific standard devices.

So far Intel's foundry business remains relatively small but the chip giant sees big upside potential for this business unit.