Posted on Monday, July 23 2012 @ 19:39 CEST by Thomas De Maesschalck
EE Times
reports ARM and TSMC signed a multi-year deal to cooperate on optimizing next-gen 64-bit ARM processor cores for FinFET process technology.
The agreement extends their collaboration beyond the 20-nm node, which TSMC (Hsinchu, Taiwan) is preparing to start manufacturing in 2013.
The collaboration is expected to show results in a 16-nm CMOS manufacturing process that will ramp in TSMC's wafer fabs in the second half of 2015. Rival foundry UMC has licensed a 20-nm FinFET manufacturing process from IBM.
The ARM-TSMC agreement specifically covers the delivery of ARM processor cores on a FinFET manufacturing process. It covers 64-bit ARM processors based on the ARMv8 architecture, Artisan physical IP and TSMC's FinFET process for use in mobile and enterprise markets.
