Moore’s Law once stated that the economics of the semiconductor market is based solely on transistor density with little regard for power. However, as applications evolved, chip producers have focused on power, performance, and area (PPA) improvements to continue the steady march of progress. In an interview, Dr. Kevin Zhang, head of TSMC’s process technologies, told Ian Cutress on the TechTechPotato YouTube channel (transcript here) that he is not concerned with Moore’s Law as long as the overall progress continues.
“Well, my simple answer is—I don’t care,” Kevin Zhang said to Ian. As long as we can continue to drive technology scaling, I don’t care if Moore’s Law is alive or dead.”
Indeed, TSMC’s strength is its ability to introduce a new process technology every year and provide the performance, power, and area (PPA) improvements its clients seek. For about a decade, Apple has been TSMC’s alpha customer, which is why the evolution of TSMC’s process technologies is very well described by the evolution of Apple's processors.
However, when you examine TSMC’s capabilities beyond Apple’s processors, you will note AMD’s Instinct MI300X and Instinct MI300A processors with AI and HPC capabilities. Both products extensively use TSMC’s 2.5D and 3D integration and are perhaps the best examples of the foundry’s capabilities.
Indeed, TSMC and its customers are focused on 3D scaling.
“[Observers] narrowly defined Moore’s Law based on two-dimensional scaling—that is no longer the case,” Zhang said. "As you look at the innovation hype in our industry, we actually continue to find different ways to integrate more functions and capabilities into smaller form factors. We continue to achieve a higher level of performance and a higher level of power efficiency. So from that perspective, I think that Moore’s Law, or technology scaling, will continue.”
When asked about TSMC’s success with incremental process node improvements, Kevin Zhang clarified that their advancements are far from minor. TSMC highlighted that the foundry’s transitions from 5nm to 3nm-class process nodes result in PPA improvements exceeding 30% per generation. TSMC continues to make smaller yet continuous enhancements between major nodes to allow customers to reap the benefits of each new technology generation.
