SEMICON Taiwan 2024: no roadblocks down to A10 in 2029

The Semi industry has qualified its roadmap down to A10 in 2029. The Technologies work in the Lab and can be industrialized. This is the Nanosheet or GAA generation.

From 3nm (2024) to A14 (2027), wafer and packaging costs will probably double. This implies that the addressable market will only be High Perf Computing / AI. Smartphones, iPhone included, don’t need the performance and can’t justify the cost.

The roadmap of the Semi industry to 2029 is geared to AI Compute. The Semi industry from chemicals, equipment makers to foundry and chip designers are clear about this: future revenue growth will come overwhelmingly from the AI segment. The Semi industry is not trying to pack more transistors in the same form-factor. It is aiming to make chips as systems, as large as possible. The new KPI is more FLOPS per Watt. Cost is a more distant concern.

The following generation post-2029 will adopt a different transistor structure, CFET which will require new lithography and new materials.