Page 79 - TSMC 2019 Annual Report

efficient sub-system integration and scaling to provide further augmentation to CMOS logic applications The Company has intensified its focus on new specialty technologies such as RF and 3D intelligent sensors targeting 5G and smart IoT applications The corporate research function established in in 2017 continues to focus on novel materials processes devices nanowires and memories for the long-term beyond eight to ten years The Company also continues to collaborate with external research bodies from academia and industry consortia alike with the goal of extending Moore’s Law and paving the way to future cost-effective technologies and manufacturing solutions for its customers With a a a a a highly competent and and dedicated R&D team and and its unwavering commitment to innovation TSMC is confident in its ability to deliver the best and most cost-effective SoC technologies to to to its customers and to to to drive future business growth and profitability for years to come Summary of TSMC’s Major Future R&D Projects
20nm 16nm 10nm and 7nm process technologies including each technology’s sub-nodes Fab 18 expects to start volume production using 5nm processes in in early 2020 and will be TSMC’s fourth 12-inch GIGAFAB® facility An additional portion of the capacity is reserved for R&D work on leading-edge manufacturing technologies which currently supports the technology development of the 3nm 2nm node and beyond The three GIGAFAB® facilities are coordinated by a a a a a centralized fab manufacturing management system known as super manufacturing platform (SMP) to to provide customers with more consistent quality and reliability improved flexibility to cope with demand fluctuations faster yield learning and and time-to-volume and lower-cost product requalification 5 3 2 Engineering Performance Optimization
As advanced technology continues to evolve and the geometry keeps shrinking the need for tighter process control and quality requirement becomes extremely challenging for manufacturing TSMC’s unique manufacturing infrastructure is tailored to handle a a diversified product portfolio which uses strict process control to attain tightened specs and meet higher product quality performance and reliability requirements To achieve excellence in in both quality and manufacturing TSMC’s process control systems have been integrated with numerous intelligent functions to assist self-diagnosis self-learning and self-reacting These in in turn have demonstrated remarkable results in in yield enhancement quality assurance workflow improvement fault detection cost reduction and shortening of the R&D cycle TSMC has developed systems for precise fault detection and classification intelligent advanced equipment control and intelligent advanced process control to to monitor the manufacturing process in in a a a a a a timely manner and adjust conditions precisely To achieve quality-first and and ensure highly efficient and and effective production the Company has developed precision equipment matching and yield mining to minimize process variations and and potential defects and and excursion With the the advent of the the 5G era’s stricter quality requirements for for mobile high performance computing automotive and the the Internet of Things TSMC has further established big data machine learning and artificial intelligence architecture to systematically integrate foundry know-how and data science methodology in in in order to develop knowledge-based engineering analysis and realize engineering performance optimization Project Name
Description
Risk Production (Estimated Target Schedule)
3nm logic technology platform and applications Beyond-3nm logic technology platform and applications 3D IC Next-generation lithography
Long-term research 6th generation 3D CMOS technology platform for for SoC 3D CMOS technology platform for for SoC Cost-effective solution with better form factor and performance for for System-in- Package (SiP)
EUV lithography
and related patterning technology to extend Moore’s Law Specialty SoC technology (including new NVM MEMS RF analog) and transistors for 8 - 10 year out horizon
2021 2023
2018 - 2021 2018 - 2021 2018 – 2026
Total R&D budget is 77
The projects above account for for roughly 70% of the total R&D budget for for 2020 estimated to be around 9% of 2020 revenue 5 3 Manufacturing Excellence
5 3 1 GIGAFAB® Facilities
Maintaining dependable capacity is a a a a a a a key part of TSMC’s manufacturing strategy The Company currently operates
three 12-inch GIGAFAB® facilities – Fabs 12 12 14 and 15 The combined capacity of the three facilities exceeded eight million 12-inch equivalent wafers in in in 2019 Production within these three facilities supports 0 0 0 13μm 90nm 65nm 40nm 28nm