2nm

According to South Korea's "Cultural Daily," Samsung Electronics' wafer fab in Taylor, Texas, is expected to enter trial operation around the end of this month, as orders for 2-nanometer chips from Tesla, Broadcom, Arm, and others continue to pour in, with pre-production capacity nearing full load. The plant has accumulated an investment of $37 billion since 2022, with plans to begin trial operation early next month and mass production next year, with an initial monthly capacity of about 50,000 wafers, close to TSMC's approximately 80,000 wafers.The report states that the Taylor plant will produce Tesla's next-generation artificial intelligence chip AI5, Broadcom's new generation communication chips, and Arm's smart device AI chips, among others. Samsung's 2-nanometer yield has increased from about 60% earlier this year to around 80% recently. The company sent personnel for process, equipment, and yield to the plant in June, and began installing equipment in July. At a recent earnings meeting, Samsung projected that this year's 2-nanometer order volume would more than double compared to last year, and stated that NVIDIA's inference chip Grok3 began mass production last month; Samsung also recently raised the foundry price for 4-nanometer chips by up to 15%.The second Taylor plant is scheduled to start construction by the end of this year and begin mass production in 2030. Samsung has requested major partners to complete the relevant production equipment safety certifications in advance, and some partners are considering sending dozens of personnel to the local area. At the same time, Intel issued about $20 billion in new shares last month and expanded investments in 2-nanometer level 18A and 1.4-nanometer level 14A, while Japan's Rapidus completed its 2-nanometer factory in Hokkaido last month and entered the wafer trial production stage.

According to South Korean media ZDNet Korea, Samsung Electronics is adjusting the original purpose of its NRD-K Line 2 at the Giheung campus from a research and development facility to a wafer foundry line, with the main target product being the 2nm base chips required for NVIDIA's HBM. This production line is expected to be operational in the second half of 2028, adopting a "Send-Fab" model, which involves receiving wafers from other mass production lines and performing specific processes.NRD-K is the most advanced composite research and development campus built by Samsung Electronics to seize future semiconductor technology, with a total investment of approximately 20 trillion won, planning for three production lines, of which the first line is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2024. This adjustment aims to proactively respond to the expansion of HBM demand driven by investments in AI infrastructure. Samsung plans to first apply the 2nm process to custom HBM and HBM5 to maintain performance advantages.Industry insiders point out that the scale of NRD-K Line 2 is relatively small, making it suitable for operation in the Send-Fab format. However, there are still about two years until the production line is operational, and the final purpose may be adjusted again based on market conditions. Samsung had previously considered using this production line for DRAM production, but after modifications to the relevant plans this month, DRAM capacity will be more concentrated in the Pyeongtaek campus. Equipment procurement orders have not yet been officially issued.