According to the latest rumors circulating on the net (and therefore to be taken as such), the next-generation semiconductor manufacturing technology of Intelcall 18A and whose lithograph would correspond to 2 nanometers, is getting better and better to the point that its marketing could be brought forward by six months. This data is very important, because advancing the plans for the launch of this lithography could mean for Intel that AMD would once again be left behind.
First of all, it must be said that the rumors come from Chinese media, whose sources have not been revealed (they say “industry sources” and nothing else). What is certain is that Pat Gelsinger (Intel CEO) announced a strategy last year with which he intended to introduce new manufacturing technologies to the market, with the aim of expanding production to transform Intel in OEM, that is, other manufacturers would send their chip designs to them for Intel to manufacture.
Intel 18A 2nm lithography could leave AMD in the doldrums
One of the goals of the aforementioned strategy announced by Gelsinger is to launch one new manufacturing technology per year; Keep in mind that according to Intel’s own data, its Intel 4 technology was slated for release later this year, but competition in the semiconductor market is at its peak, and TSMC has already submitted plans for various advanced technologies, including 2nm lithography, identical to Intel’s Le 18A.
The rumor we’re talking about now claims that Intel’s answer to TSMC’s 2nm technology, the Intel Node 18A, is growing to the point that it’s expected to hit the market about six months early. In the current state of the market, this means that once again AMD (and NVIDIA, Samsung, etc.) could again fall behind Intel in terms of chip-making technology, which can be quite a setback. for Lisa Su’s plans.
Intel’s technology roadmap was unveiled in June last year, and up to 5 new manufacturing technologies have already been outlined there. At this time, Intel also renamed its manufacturing processes to abandon the false belief that names corresponded to transistor sizes, which until now had always led people to believe that Intel technologies were ahead of those of TSMC, when in fact they were more on equal footing, just like now.
Intel plans ahead
In this roadmap that we told you about earlier, Intel detailed the names of its new manufacturing processes: Intel 10, Intel 7, Intel 4, Intel 3, Intel 20A (angström) and Intel 18A. Of these, as you can imagine, the 18A is the most advanced of them all, and at the time the company had already announced that it would be ready by early 2025, as you can see on the picture above. For this reason, and if these rumors reaching us now turn out to be true, it means that we could see this node ready by mid-2024, in about two years, with the first products based on it at the end of the same year or early 2025.
However, we re-emphasize the fact that we are dealing with a rumor at this time, Intel has not said a word about it and the most prudent thing would be to wait for an official statement from the company before continuing to hope for this . What is clear is that it looks like Intel is having a very soft moment in this area, while its main competitor in the processor market, AMD, is suffering the opposite.
