Samsung Electronics Holds 'Foundry Forum' in San Jose, USA... Spotlight on 'Surprise Announcement'

Foundry Roadmap and AI Semiconductor Strategy Announced
Mass Production of 1.4nm Expected Sooner
Speakers Include CEO Rene Haas and Others

Samsung Electronics will hold its annual 'Foundry Forum' in Silicon Valley, USA, to unveil related strategies. Since the foundry process roadmap has been disclosed at this event every year, there is keen interest in whether Samsung Electronics will make a surprise announcement this year as well.

In June of last year, Choi Si-young, President of Samsung Electronics Foundry Division, delivered the keynote speech at the 'Samsung Foundry Forum 2023' held in Silicon Valley, California.
[Image source=Yonhap News]

According to industry sources on the 12th, Samsung Electronics' Foundry Division will hold the 'Samsung Foundry Forum·SAFE Forum 2024' on the 12th and 13th (local time) at the Samsung Semiconductor Campus in San Jose, USA.

At this event, Samsung Electronics plans to announce its foundry technology roadmap and strategies to strengthen the artificial intelligence (AI) semiconductor ecosystem, sharing them with partners and customers. It is known that executives from Samsung Electronics' semiconductor divisions, including Choi Si-young, President of the Foundry Division, and Lee Jung-bae, President of the Memory Division, will all attend.

The keynote speech will be delivered by President Choi. He is expected to present Samsung Electronics' cutting-edge foundry process roadmap in response to the AI era. Previously, at the 2022 Foundry Forum, Samsung Electronics declared that it would mass-produce semiconductors using 2-nanometer (nm; one billionth of a meter) process technology in 2025 and 1.4-nanometer process technology in 2027. At last year's event, Samsung became the first in the industry to present a detailed 2-nanometer process roadmap ahead of Taiwan's TSMC, the global foundry leader. Nanometer refers to the semiconductor circuit linewidth; the narrower the linewidth, the lower the power consumption and the faster the processing speed. Currently, the most advanced technology in mass production is 3-nanometer, produced only by TSMC and Samsung Electronics.

Industry insiders speculate that Samsung Electronics may make a 'surprise announcement' again this time by advancing the mass production schedule for the 1.4-nanometer process. Since TSMC has accelerated its 1-nanometer mass production schedule, the industry is paying close attention to Samsung's upcoming 1-nanometer process roadmap. TSMC announced in April that it plans to start semiconductor production using a 1.6-nanometer process from 2026, adding the 1.6-nanometer process between the 2-nanometer and 1.4-nanometer processes scheduled for mass production in 2025?2027, thereby advancing the entry into the 1-nanometer era by one year.

Meanwhile, at this Samsung Electronics Foundry Forum, executives from long-time partner companies, including Rene Haas, CEO of Arm, and Bill Eun, Vice President of Corporate at AMD, will participate as speakers to lend their support.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.