Intel – SemiAnalysis

Amazon Graviton 3 Uses Chiplets & Advanced Packaging To Commoditize High Performance CPUs | The First PCIe 5.0 And DDR5 Server CPU

December 2, 2021December 7, 2021 Dylan Patel 1 Comment Amazon, AMD, AWS, AWS EBS, AWS Elastic Block Storage., AWS Nitro, DDR5, Graviton 2, Graviton 3, Graviton2, Graviton3, Intel, Neoverse N1, Neoverse N2, Neoverse V1, Nitro, PCIe 5.0

Shots are being fired at merchant silicon.
Amazon’s Graviton3 completely commoditizes generalized CPU compute while also bringing advanced packaging, PCIe 5.0, and DDR5 to the server market ~6 months before Intel and AMD.
Server and rack level system architecture choices propel Graviton 3 to new heights in cost per unit of compute.
There’s something special about the packaging behind the paywall.

China Micron NAND Samsung

The Impending Chinese NAND Apocalypse – YMTC 128 Layer NAND Is The First Semiconductor Where China Is Technologically Competitive

September 28, 2021September 28, 2021 Dylan Patel 1 Comment Intel, Kioxia, Micron, NAND, Samsung, SK Hynix, Western Digital, YMTC

YMTC 128 Layer NAND is the first semiconductor where China is technologically competitive with the leading edge firms from the Western sphere of influence.
Yields are improving and the 2nd fab is being filled with equipment. Once that milestone is reached, the 3rd and 4th fab will be built simultaneously.

Intel Logic Packaging Qualcomm Silicon Photonics

Intel Grossly Exaggerates Foundry “Wins” With Qualcomm And Amazon, There Are No Deals For Manufacturing Chips

July 29, 2021August 3, 2021 Dylan Patel 0 Comments 20A, Amazon, IFS, Intel, Intel Custom Foundry, Packaging, Qualcomm

Intel touted huge wins with Qualcomm and Amazon for their foundry business, but a deeper investigation reveals there are no chips deals penned. Intel will only package for Amazon, and Qualcomm is only evaluating the technology.

Micron NAND Texas Instruments

Micron Sells 3D X-Point Lehi, Utah Fab to Texas Instruments For $1.5B

June 30, 2021August 3, 2021 Dylan Patel 0 Comments 3D X-Point, IMFT, Intel, Micron, NAND, Optane, Texas Instruments, X-Point

Micron to Sell Lehi, Utah, Fab to Texas Instruments for $1.5B.
This is the fab that was part of the Intel/Micron IMFT joint venture. It currently produces 3D X-Point and NAND memory. Intel will need to ramp Optane production at another fab like their New Mexico fab.

Intel Logic Nvidia Silicon Photonics TSMC

Intel’s Trojan Horse into the Foundry Business | Co-packaged Silicon Photonics is Intel’s Path Forward for IDM 2.0

June 11, 2021August 3, 2021 Dylan Patel 1 Comment Barefoot, Barefoot Tofino, Co-packaged Optics, ICF, IDM 2.0, Intel, Intel Custom Foundry, Nvidia, Optical Trancievers, Photonic Engine, Silicon Photonics, TensTorrent, Tofinio 2, Wormhole

Intel is struggling against TSMC, AMD, Apple, Nvidia, Amazon, etc.
They have a potential ace which would allow them to remain at the heart of datacenter and force industry dependency.
Co-packaged silicon photonics is Intel’s Trojan Horse into the foundry business!

Intel Logic

Google New Custom Silicon Replaces 10 Million Intel CPUs | Google Argos VPU

June 2, 2021August 3, 2021 Dylan Patel 0 Comments Argos, AV1, Custom Silicon, EDA, Google, H264, H265, Intel, Nvidia, Skylake, Taffel, VCU, VP9, YouTube

Google’s New Custom Argos Silicon Replaces 10 Million Intel CPUs! The Argos VPU allows them to enable VP9 across all of their services. In the process of building this chip, Google even created their own EDA tool called Taffel!