Intel’s 18A-P Goes Beyond a 9% Speed Bump, Adding 50% Better Thermal Conductivity and Tighter Skew Corners to Win Foundry Customers

As Intel primes its 18A-P process technology at external customers, the company is sharing new insights into its enhanced performance & features.

Intel's External Customer-Focused 18A-P Process Node Offers 9% Performance Boost or 18% Power Savings Versus 18A

Intel's 18A process technology is ramping up well, with Panther Lake volume being increased significantly in the months ahead. As 18A becomes the standard for Intel's in-house chips, the company is also tuning its enhanced 18A-P node, which is a key technology aimed at attracting external Foundry customers.

At VLSI, Intel will be sharing some more details about the features and enhancements that 18A-P brings to the table, but before the conference in June, Intel is giving a preview of 18A-P. The following is what Intel states for 18A-P at the VLSI webpage:

Intel 18A-P is a performance-enhanced, RibbonFET gate-all-around (GAA) transistor technology with backside power delivery through PowerVia. Relative to Intel 18A, Intel 18A‑P offers over 18% lower power at iso-performance, or over 9% performance gain at iso‑power. This improvement is achieved through newly added technology features, transistor performance enhancement, interconnect enhancement and design technology co-optimizations (DTCO).

Added features in Intel 18A-P include additional logic VT pairs, skew corner tightening, new low power devices in both high-density (HD) and high-performance (HP) libraries and performance-improved HP devices in both libraries. In addition, Intel 18A-P offers reduced thermal resistance for improved heat conduction.

Starting with the details, Intel shared a few performance and power figures of 18A-P based on the Arm core substack. As per the figures, 18A-P delivers a ~9% uplift in speed (performance) at the same power, or delivers ~18% power savings at the same performance versus 18A. These are nice upticks versus 18A since the "P" variant is more or less a further optimization of the same node.

In the detailed feature list, Intel states that the Library Height and Contacted Poly Pitch remain the same as 18A. The changes include support of new low and high power transistors, additional BT pairs (5+ for VT versus 4 in 18A), along with a new Logic VT between ULVT & LVT. The skew corners are also tightened by 30%, further enhancing the performance variability within the 18A-P node.

Intel 18A vs 18A-P Feature Comparison

Category	Feature	18A	18A-P
Performance	Performance @ Iso-Power	1x	9% Iso-Power Performance Gain
Design Rules	Contacted Poly Pitch (nm)	50	50
Library Height (nm)	—	180 / 160	180 / 160
Transistor	Available Devices	Z2, Z3 Z1, Z2, Z3	Z2, Z3 Z1, Z2, Z3 Z1 (Low Power) Z1.5 (Low Power) Z3P (HP contact)
VT Options	Logic VT Pairs	4 pairs of Logic VTs	5+ pairs of Logic VTs (New Logic VT between ULVT and LVT) Lower ULVT
Skew Corners	—	—	~30% tightening in skew corners
Interconnect RC	—	Intel 18A Base Process	V0-V2 R reduction M2-M4 jogs
Thermals	—	—	Improved thermal conductivity by 50%

One of the biggest updates is the 50% improvement in thermal conductivity. This doesn't necessarily mean that the chips will run cool; instead, it means that the 18A-P will help with the conductivity or transfer of heat better to avoid thermal thresholds.

Intel also showcases the performance improvements in 18A-P technology versus 18A through a plot diagram that lists the Ring Oscillator Frequency with respect to Normalized Capacitance. The plot chart shows 18A-P offering better speed, better power, and better contacts.

Label	Color/Shape	Meaning
W1	Green dots	New device with high-performance contacts — the best-performing cluster with highest ring oscillator frequency.
W2	Dark squares + green	Intermediate step showing improved mobility (electrons move more easily through the channel).
W3	Dark squares	Further iteration, higher performance.
W3P	Blue dots	New device with high-performance contacts — the best-performing cluster with the highest ring oscillator frequency.

All of this goes on to show that 18A-P isn't just a slight uptick in performance; it has key changes that are being implemented to get more customers on board. Now the question is how customers react to the PDK. Reports highlight that as 18A-P and 14A PDK mature, Intel is poised to see recieved increased customer confidence within its foundry ventures.

News Source: Dr. Ian Cutress

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