GlobalFoundries Is Happy with Its 2018 Decision

choi

Not to Compete with TSMC and Samsung on Moore's Law


Eric Anderson, IBM Seeks Billions After GlobalFoundries Drops Chip Effort; Malta fab scrapped costly pursuit of 'bleeding edge' technology.  Albany, NY: Times Union, June 8, 2021.
https://www.timesunion.com/busin ... -drops-16232598.php

Note:
(a) GlobalFoundries
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GlobalFoundries
("headquartered in Malta, New York * * * GlobalFoundries was created by the [2009] divestiture of the manufacturing arm of Advanced Micro Devices (AMD)" )

Town of Malta is 20-mile air distance due north of Albany, the capital.
(b) "GlobalFoundries on Monday [June 7] filed a complaint seeking to have IBM's claim, and the threat of legal action, dismissed"

The pre-emptive strike by GlobalFoundries is to seek declaratory judgment (not money) that a plaintiff (GlobalFoundries) owes nothing. A declaratory judgment is pre-emptive, because a plaintiff in a case like this does not wait for defendant to sue him or it (to avert uncertainty during the wait, for example).

(c) kill (body of water)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kill_(body_of_water)
, as in Town of Fishkill, New York.
(d) GlobalFoundries has not entered 7nm. Its most advanced is 14 nm at East Fishkill (which is close to Intel's 12 nm). See next.
(e) Rick Merritt, GlobalFoundries Sells Ex-IBM Fab. EE Times Asia, Apr 24, 2019.
https://www.eetasia.com/globalfoundries-sells-ex-ibm-fab/

Note: ON Semiconductor
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ON_Semiconductor
(headquarters  Phoenix, Arizona; section 1 History: "ON Semiconductor was founded in 1999. The company was originally a spinoff of Motorola's Semiconductor Components Group")
(f) Press release: US Department of Defense Partners with GLOBALFOUNDRIES to Manufacture Secure Chips at Fab 8 in Upstate New York. GlobalFoundries, Feb 15, 2021
https://globalfoundries.com/pres ... chips-fab-8-upstate
("GLOBALFOUNDRIES® (GF®), the world’s leading specialty foundry, today announced a strategic partnership with the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) to provide a secure and reliable supply of semiconductor solutions manufactured at GF’s Fab 8 in Malta, New York — the company’s most advanced semiconductor manufacturing facility. These semiconductor chips will be used in some of the DoD's most sensitive applications for land, air, sea, and space systems.  Under the agreement, GF will provide a supply of chips built at Fab 8 on its differentiated 45nm SOI platform")

There is no need to read the rest.

(g) Willy Shih (Harvard professor), GlobalFoundries' Advanced Semiconductor Fab In Upstate New York Is An Unexpected Link In Global Supply Chains. Forbes, Sept 3, 2020.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/wil ... ns/?sh=5bfbb15d2190

Quote:

"Fab 8, which is one of GlobalFoundries' most advanced semiconductor fabrication facilities, represents almost $15 billion in investments made over the last decade. Close to $4.5 billion of that was in construction costs for the half-million square foot cleanroom and supporting infrastructure, and $10 billion for the advanced tools needed to make leading edge semiconductor devices.

"As with other fabs of this class, the highly automated 300 mm wafer handling and real-time dispatching system ensure that very few people actually are physically in the cleanroom. Most are sitting in front of computer display screens outside, monitoring or controlling things remotely.

"Our tour guides were from the factory automation engineering team, and they were role models for the types of high-tech jobs that a facility like this creates. Both had associate's degrees [which means they went to community college for TWO years (in semiconductor, though), and that is it; as opposed to bachelor's degree after 4 years in a college], and as they explained their automation and work-in-process handling strategies, one couldn't fail to be impressed with the depth and sophistication of their engineering skills. Fab 8 has brought approximately 3,000 jobs to this predominantly agricultural region.

"To put it succinctly, $15 billion of capital investment does not give you enough scale to compete at the most advanced semiconductor nodes. You would actually need several times that amount to first install the capacity, and then generate revenue sufficient to earn a return on such a huge investment.

"GlobalFoundries was originally a spin-off of AMD’s manufacturing operations. The company acquired the former Chartered Semiconductor in Singapore, and IBM's semiconductor operations in Burlington, Vermont, and East Fishkill, New York, though it recently sold the latter to ON Semiconductor. * * * Much has been made of AMD’s recent success in competing with Intel. Credit for some of that success was attributed to a decision to pivot its manufacturing from GlobalFoundries to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), for which it reportedly paid a $325 million break-up fee to exit its exclusive supplier agreement with GlobalFoundries. That report made it sound like a hostage deal, but the real problem was different – GlobalFoundries could not make the economics for investing in the most advanced processes work, so AMD really didn't have much choice. There was nowhere else for it [AMD] to go to.

"IBM used to have its own captive semiconductor manufacturing as well. Its priority then was to maintain process technology leadership to ensure that chips it produced for its mainframes would have an advantage in the marketplace. But it didn’t have the production scale necessary to justify continuing investments, so ultimately it sold [by PAYING GlobalFoundries] its operations to GlobalFoundries. Actually, it gave GlobalFoundries a long-term contract to take over its fabs and manufacture for it.