TSMC to Expand CoWoS Capacity by 60% Yearly Through 2026
by Anton Shilov on May 21, 2024 11:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Semiconductors
- TSMC
- CoWoS
- SoIC
- TSMC Symposium 2024
Customer demand for AI and HPC processors is driving a much greater use of advanced packaging technologies, particularly TSMC's chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) services. As things stand, TSMC is just barely meeting the current demand for this packaging method – never mind future demand – which is why last year the company announced plans to more than double CoWoS capacity by the end of 2024. But as it turns out, just doubling capacity once won't be enough, and the world's largest contract maker of chips is going to have to keep scaling up at a rapid pace.
At its European Technology Symposium last week TSMC announced plans to expand CoWoS capacity at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of over 60% till at least 2026. As a result, TSMC's CoWoS capacity will more than quadruple from 2023 levels by the end of that period. And keeping in mind that TSMC is prepping additional versions of CoWoS (namely CoWoS-L) that will enable building system-in-packages (SiPs) of up to eight reticle sizes, increasing CoWoS capacity by four-fold in three years may still not be enough. The good news is that the various third-party off-site assembly and testing (OSAT) providers are also expanding their CoWoS-like capacity, so the demand for advanced packing isn't a problem that TSMC is facing (or resolving) on their own.
And CoWoS isn't the only advanced packaging technology line whose capacity TSMC is looking to rapidly expand. The company also has its system-on-integrated chips (SoIC) 3D stacking technology which adoption is poised to grow in the coming years. To meet demand for its SoIC packaging methods TSMC will expand SoIC capacity at a 100% compound annual growth rate by the end of 2026. As a result, SoIC capacity will grow by eight-fold from 2023 levels by late 2026.
Overall, TSMC itself expects leading-edge SiPs for demanding applications like AI and HPC will adopt both CoWoS and SoIC 3D stacking technologies in the coming years, which is why it needs to increase capacity for both methods to be able to build those highly-complex processors.
Source: TSMC European Technology Symposium 2024
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FWhitTrampoline - Tuesday, May 21, 2024 - link
Why is TSMC not explaining in front of the US Congress why TSMC failed to anticipate the actual demand for its CoWoS IC packaging services. And this is a prime example of why IBM second sourced it supply contracts so as not to be dependent on a single source for that.It's too late for any RDNA4 Multi-GCD based high end GPUs that required TSMC's CoWoS packaging as that's been put off in favor of MI300 being prioritized for the limited CoWoS services, as the markups for Mi300 more than justifies AMD making that business decision! But TSMC's cost AMD revenues there from not having any high end RDNA4 GPU offerings this generation.
The Chips Act does have a stress on funding IC Packaging as one of the areas to be funded for R&D development of Standardized forms of IC Chiplet packaging that the entire industry utilizes. But the US/World regulators need to be at TSMCs neck there for underestimating the demand to that CoWoS capacity that's totally controlled by TSMC and so many in the computing market dependent on only one IC packaging supplier!
PeachNCream - Tuesday, May 21, 2024 - link
"Why is TSMC not explaining in front of the US Congress why TSMC failed to anticipate the actual demand for its CoWoS IC packaging services."Because Congress didn't ask probably.
FWhitTrampoline - Wednesday, May 22, 2024 - link
They are needing to get TSMC on the Hot Seat ASAP because TSMC's mistake has caused Business losses/disruptions. And TSMC's pretty much a Natural Monopoly, which in and of itself is not illegal! But when some Monopoly's business decisions can so affect a larger market place via TSMC's supply chain Monopoly Market Share then Congress needs to hold hearings to find out what went wrong at TSMC to cause that CoWoS capacity issue that's so affected that AI and GPU market and other accelerators and products that depend on TSMC's CoWoS IC Packaging services!Terry_Craig - Tuesday, May 21, 2024 - link
CoWoS is not the ideal solution for a gaming-oriented Multi-GCD design... AMD needs to modify its data processing structure to eliminate the need for inter-chip communication.FWhitTrampoline - Wednesday, May 22, 2024 - link
CoWoS is TSMC's IC packaging solution that goes along with TSMCs IC diffusion solutions but that CoWoS is limited to only ICs diffused at TSMC's Foundries.I'd look at Intel's IC/Tiles/Chiplets Packaging solutions that Intel Fabs will be certifying for any clients regardless of if they us Intel's IC diffusion services or not. And Intel fabs diffuses parts of Meteor Lake's IC/Tiles in house with some diffused at TSMC as well so Intel's IC chip packaging IP is already certified for ICs diffused by TSMC and IC diffused at Intel Fabs!
The US Chips Act needs to fund some Industry Standard Chiplet packaging solutions for the current disaggregated MCM/Module based processor designs as that's what all processors will be based on where systems are made up of multiple ICs fabricated of whatever process node best suits that to be packaged together on modules to produce working SOCs/Processors for whatever end use!
eldakka - Tuesday, May 21, 2024 - link
> Why is TSMC not explaining in front of the US Congress why TSMC failed to anticipate the actual demand for its CoWoS IC packaging services.Because TSMC is not an American company, so it can tell congress to go and pound sand?
FWhitTrampoline - Wednesday, May 22, 2024 - link
TSMC is doing business in the US and even has a Fab Located in Arizona and any Corporation doing business in the US with US companies can get called before congress and any corporation(Foreign or Domestic doing any US business) can have their license to do business with US companies or consumers revoked!See the US Commerce Department and the laws and regulations that it can enforce and look at some Peoples Republic of Chinese Companies currently after Congress enacted additional measures for that!
P.S. Telling the US Congress to Pound Sand is the same as telling a US Judge to do the same with the subpoena powers that the US Congress has.
Threska - Wednesday, May 22, 2024 - link
"...and any corporation(Foreign or Domestic doing any US business) can have their license to do business with US companies or consumers revoked!"TikTok says Hi.