TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Intel’s partnership with TSMC could expand to more of the Taiwanese chipmaker’s 2-nanometer chips, CTEE reported Thursday.
While Intel continues to develop its own 18A manufacturing process, industry sources said the company is also outsourcing additional chips for its high-end processors to TSMC. The move could give Intel greater flexibility in managing production capacity while reducing its reliance on a single manufacturing process.
Intel’s upcoming Nova Lake platform, expected to debut early next year, will combine chips made using its own 18A process with chips outsourced to TSMC’s N2P process. N2P is an enhanced version of TSMC’s 2 nm technology designed to deliver higher performance, according to TSMC.
Intel’s subsequent Razor Lake platform could adopt TSMC’s N2X process. Another high-performance version of TSMC’s 2 nm technology designed for applications including high-frequency processors, AI, and high-performance computing.
The expansion could also benefit Taiwanese suppliers, as the more advanced N2X process requires greater precision in steps such as material deposition, etching, cleaning, and wafer surface polishing. Companies such as Kinik Co. and Praise Victor Industrial Co. provide materials and equipment-related products for semiconductor manufacturing.
Praise Victor is one of the few Taiwanese companies capable of mass-producing chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) pads. Its semiconductor business grew 25% from a year earlier in the first half of the year, accounting for 66% of total revenue.
As chipmakers move toward smaller process nodes, maintaining flat wafer surfaces and controlling defects becomes increasingly challenging. This is boosting the need for CMP, which smooths wafer surfaces during chip production, as well as the specialized materials used in the process.
Praise Victor said its existing manufacturing capacity is insufficient to keep pace with orders. It is expanding capacity in China’s Hefei and Central Taiwan Science Park to support the shift toward more advanced semiconductor production.
Kinik supplies CMP diamond discs and recycled wafers. Diamond discs restore the surface of CMP polishing pads, allowing them to maintain their effectiveness during wafer polishing.
Recycled wafers are used silicon wafers that are cleaned and restored for reuse, mainly in semiconductor equipment testing and calibration. They can cost about 70%-80% less than new wafers, while their production requires 60%-80% less energy and water, according to Pocket Securities.
