Korean semiconductor giant Samsung has achieved 80% production yield with its 8-nanometer chip manufacturing process, according to a media report from the Seoul Economic Daily. Samsung's yields are a frequent feature of industry discussion, with multiple media reports highlighting the firm's struggles with production efficiency. A process technology's yield is a crucial metric of its commercialization, and lower yields often lead to foundries having to bear the cost of defective products which their customers are unable to use or sell.
NVIDIA Backed Groq Relying On Samsung For Its Chip Production Requirements
According to the details, NVIDIA backed Groq has ordered the production of its language processing units (LPUs) from Samsung Foundry. Groq's LPU chips are specialty hardware designed specifically for inference in artificial intelligence applications. There are currently three generations of LPU chips, with the latest, the third generation, announced at NVIDIA's GTC conference earlier this year. The third generation chip is dubbed the NVIDIA Groq 3 LPX and it acts as the inference accelerator for NVIDIA's latest Rubin AI chips.
Groq had announced in 2023 that it had partnered up with Samsung Foundry to manufacture the second generation LPU with the 4nm process technology. The process, officially dubbed the SF4X, would allow Groq to build systems that use anywhere between 85,000 to 600,000 chips without relying on additional external chips.
Samsung Achieves Mature Production With 4-nanometer Process Technology, Says Report
The Economic Daily's report suggests that Groq has also asked Samsung Foundry to produce its third generation LPU chips. According to a report form The Chosun Daily in March, NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang confirmed that Samsung Foundry will manufacture its third generator Groq LPUs as well.
However, as per The Economic Daily, IBM, Baidu and a Chinese cryptocurrency firm are also procuring their 4-nanometer chips from Samsung. The Daily's report claims that Samsung's production yield for the process technology's production has reached 80%. Consequently, the technology is now in the mature production stage, which follows mass production. The 4-nanometer process has kicked off mass production in November 2023.
The latest manufacturing process technologies right now are the 2-nanometer processes. On this front, a recent report from the Korean press earlier this month suggested that Samsung's 2-nanometer yields were unable to cross 60%. On the other side, TSMC's 2-nanometer yields are reportedly at 90% which solidifies the firm's lead in the global contract semiconductor manufacturing industry.
About the author: Ramish is a seasoned technology writer and editor with more than a decade of experience. He specializes in semiconductor fabrication and market analysis. With a background in finance and supply chain management - via his bachelors in Finance and a micromasters in supply chain management from MIT - Ramish combines financial rigor with deep industry insight to deliver accurate and authoritative coverage.
Follow Wccftech on Google to get more of our news coverage in your feeds.
