China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip leadership

Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by pastrami_panda on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @07:03AM (#24130693)

Don't forget 12 nm is still the best Intel can fab, it might not be world class currently but it's certainly very capable. Imo it's very threatening, especially if they also keep grabbing talent like they seem to be capable of doing.

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by mamon on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @07:33AM (#24130931)

Don't forget Intel's nanometers are smaller than TSMC nanometers. TSMC 12nm is 25% lower transistor density that Intel's 14nm

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by 9nGQluzmnq3M on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @07:53AM (#24131082)

Wait what? I had no idea this was a thing, can you explain?

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by ChoGGi on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @08:45AM (#24131465)

Ever since (I think) 28nm, companies stopped using nm as an actual gate length and changed it to a marketing size.

Edit: https://en.wikichip.org/wiki/technology_node

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by mensetmanusman on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @05:33PM (#24137252)

There is no standard comparison because of different architectures.

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by chasd00 on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @09:02AM (#24131622)

that's crazy, and news to me. So now a unit of length is a marketing term. This is even more misleading than branding the word "real" so you can advertise "contains Real(tm) cheese" on food products.

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by pkaye on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @02:51PM (#24135433)

I think it comes down to what feature length you are measuring. Transistor density seems like a better measure.

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by guidedlight on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @08:13AM (#24131227)

Intel has 10nm fabrication, which is equivalent to TSMC’s 7nm

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by andreime on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @04:43PM (#24136718)

Intel doesn't yet have 10nm https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-says-first-10nm-desk... company also revealed that its first 10nm CPUs for the desktop won't come to market until the second half of 2021."

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by muricula on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @05:49PM (#24137401)

10nm Intel CPUs exist. I have seen them with my own eyes. Reading the tea leaves from public statements and articles like that, the yields seem to be crap right now.

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by dyingkneepad on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @08:17PM (#24138664)

I am typing this reply from a Lenovo Thinkbook 14-IIL, that has a 10nm CPU, also known by its codename Ice Lake. It's not a desktop CPU, it's a mobile CPU, but it's enough to counter your claim that "Intel doesn't yet have 10nm".

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Re:China hires over 100 TSMC engineers in push for chip lead... by samfisher83 on Wednesday August 12, 2020 @09:15AM (#24131730)

Their yields aren't very good at 10nm.

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