Rapidus 2nm Chip Production: A Threat for TSMC?
Quite often you might have heard some names like TSMC, SAMSUNG, INTEL, Global Foundries, SMIC, UMC and few more. These are actually some of the biggest semiconductor foundries across globe. These are mainly based at Taiwan, Korea, US & China. These foundries are doing great in there business but in between all this there is one foundry which is coming form Japan is gaining attention worldwide. Japan as a country wants to thrive the semiconductor business which is scaling up at a very high rate across world. Japan as a country has not been able to ride the semiconductor chip wave which is surprising to see keeping in mind the resources, material & capabilities they possess.
To execute their semiconductor plans they have formed a fabrication company named as “Rapidus”. This foundry is being backed by big Japanese firms such as Denso, Softbank, Sony, Toyota, Mitsubishi UFJ bank and many others. If this semiconductor initiative by Japanese government turn out to be successful then it will provide big boost to not only Japan’s semiconductor plans to thrive cutting edge low tech node developments but it will also be helpful for businesses originating from JAPAN and are heavily dependent on semiconductor supplies such as Toyota motors and Sony. That’s the reason both of these fims have full backing to Rapidus.
Rapidus Roadmap & Business Outlook:
Lets go couple of years back, Rapidus was started in August 2022. As reported by EE Times Japan, total 7.3 billion yen investment was given by top firms in Japan to start this foundry, other than 6 billion $ aid from government. It shows that there is no financial crash for this initiative. However the capital requirement to kick off chip production is also enlarge. Rapidus eyeing fabrication of 2nm chips by early 2027. With the production of 2nm chips Rapidus will go hands to hands with big fabrication giants TSMC, Samsung & Intel foundry. Although the big tech giants are expected to bring their 2nm chip production by 2025 in Market. Along with Chip production Rapidus is also expected to incorporate chip testing & advance packaging in their newly constructed fab.
Rapidus already have signed a long term deal with IBM in 2022, for their 2nm Gate All around FET (GAA FET) chip productions. Rapidus & IBM have signed agreement on “chiplets development along with Package design & manufacturing technology for 2nm” , under this act Rapidus engineers are working in close collaboration with IBM engineers at their R&D center in North America. This Japanese foundry is expected to use ASML’S EUV manufacturing equipment for its 2nm production.
Rapidus 2nm Production is Threat for TSMC?
Rapidus is also eyeing to make partnerships with some big brands like Google, Meta, Apple, Amazon. As the demand of high performance chips are accelerating Rapidus CEO Atsuyoshi Koike believes that TSMC will not be able to cater all requirements, as the volume of production required to meet demands of each company will be very high. Although winning the trust of big tech giant is not going to be a cakewalk for newly formed foundry like “Rapidus”. TSMC is already far ahead in this competition & winning the trust of those Tier1 companies whom TSMC serves is never going to be an easy task. The only way for them to take an entry is by offering fair pricing, good yield & competitive tech nodes to their promising customers.
The way Rapidus is enabling semiconductor chip production in japan, Tata semiconductor is also driving semiconductor enablement in India. Tata has started its fabrication plant in Gujarat, India in 2024, since then they also have made several initiatives. In case if you wish to know more about how TATA is driving India’s semiconductor hope, check out the link given below:
Tata Semiconductor Initiatives in India
Overall this initiative could be a make or break to Japan’s semiconductor hopes. Overall at international arena this could be a great serving step for various customers as the demand of semiconductor chips are only going to increase due to AI, hyperscaler’s, data centers requirements and TSMC, IFS (Intel Foundry service) & Samsung might not be able to fulfill all the requirements. Even if we skip the big tech giants there are various other startups who are aggressively working in this fields and they require high performance chips, this newly formed Japanese foundry can be a decent option for them. Will be interesting to see how Rapidus churns out the semiconductor chip opportunities lying ahead in coming years.
If you wish to know more about Rapidus foundry, its competitors & how it is going to win big customers despite the presence of big semiconductor foundries such as TSMC, Intel, Samsung etc. You can surely consider to watch this video.
