With Intel’s latest layoffs, will the Ohio plant ever be built?

[ChrisGar]

Ireland is 4nm and 3nm? They should be ramping up. I just hope that Intel can add some foundry business to that so they stay full. Intel 3/4nm are good solid nodes. Where is the NOT TSMC business here? My concern is that the Intel Foundry sales team are mostly Intel sales people and not foundry sales people. If I was Lip-Bu I would re energize the sale team/replace them. The process nodes are ready, now the rubber hits the road.

I'm not sure about the entire staff or who attends the meetings -- but the head of foundry, Kevin O'Buckley, is an engineer.

 

[MKWVentures]

I must have missed this announcement. At the Intel event only one foundry customer was named and that was MediaTek on Intel 16. I spoke to Intel directly about this as well.

I am wondering about the cozy relationship with MediaTek. They are a very Taiwanese company and the CEO is the former TSMC CEO. Maybe there is some bad blood there? But again, if you want good TSMC pricing sing the praises of Intel Foundry.

I do not believe Intel has 9 committed 18A tapeouts that will result in real products. I believe that there are 9 plans to check out Intel on some products some of which will disappear. Others will be added.

I think Revenue (which is dropping) and Tapeouts (which is not growing fast) is the indicator. it may be trailing but until we get some non-intel input, it is the only data that we should trust IMHO.

We should have projected revenue for 2026 and 2027 and Projected Tapeouts for 2025, 2026 from Intel. Then compare actuals. Intel has this data and has info on how it is changed over the past 2 years.

 

[MKWVentures]

@nghanayem

So your thought is that it is too early to see revenue or tapeouts for 18A or Intel 3.


When would you expect to see >10 tapeouts total on 18A?
When would you expect to see 1.5B in annual wafer revenue (making intel a top 10 foundry).

When did TSMC release its PDK 1.0 for N2 compared to Intel for 18A?

 

[nghanayem]

I do not believe Intel has 9 committed 18A tapeouts that will result in real products. I believe that there are 9 plans to check out Intel on some products some of which will disappear. Others will be added.

Intel has by my count over the past 2 years announced 7 signed wafer agreements for 18A. In 2023 two unamed defense related ones and one unamed customer who in their contract will at some point pay out Intel a prepay for their capacity. In 2024 Microsoft AI chip, Amazon AI fabric chip, and in like the Q3 earnings Intel announced two more unamed 18A wafer agreements. Is it really so impossible to believe that I missed the last two 18A design wins or that there were two that weren't mentioned when Intel was busy talking about things investors cared more about like Falcon Shores, Intel products over projecting revenue again, or the CEO leaving?

I think Revenue (which is dropping)

I already explained why revenue isn't a useful metric to understand momentum and why Intel foundry external revenue now isn't a like for like with what it was back when they were selling substrates to OSATs during the pandemic and while they were also including IMS tool sales in IFS revenue.

and Tapeouts (which is not growing fast)

18A literally couldn't have had a single non Intel products tapeout until PDK 1.0 shipped in the back half of last year. That would be as foolish as saying "mmmmm TSMC N2 customer interest looks pretty weak to me if they only taped out 0 customer designs in 2023.".

So your thought is that it is too early to see revenue or tapeouts for 18A or Intel 3.

Yes. That is obvious. It isn't opinion it is an indisputable fact.

When would you expect to see >10 tapeouts total on 18A?

I don't know depends on customer schedule and when a 10th design win is landed (if it hasn't already). Based on their being 9 paying customers by EOY24, at the absolute earliest 10 18A tapeouts by EOY2027 or EOY2028.

When would you expect to see 1.5B in annual wafer revenue (making intel a top 10 foundry).

Before 2030 but after 2026 since Intel said their plans for a 2027 break even assumed negligible external revenue.

When did TSMC release its PDK 1.0 for N2 compared to Intel for 18A?

Mid 2024 for TSMC and late 2024 for 18A. I have noted reducing the gap between HVM readiness and foundry readiness needing to be a major focus point going forward on a couple of prior occasions. But since the top ten design houses started working on N2 designs since at least 2020, Intel foundry only started in mid 2021, and first customers were only signed in 2022, the gap between first Apple N2 product launch and first 18A external product launch will probably be closer to a year (rather than just the 6mo gap between PDK1.0 release). Lines up well with first 18A tapeout supposedly being due in 2H25 while first TSMC tapeout (almost assuredly Apple) was like 2H24.