This afternoon, TSMC announced its Q1 2020 quarter earnings. The company recorded a revenue of about $103.1 billion, a 45.2% annual increase. TSMC’s advanced process contributed a lot to its Q1 revenue. Generally, the 7nm, 10nm, and 16nm processes contributed 35%, 0.5%, and 19% respectively. After the 7nm process, TSMC’s 5nm process mass-production will commence. According to the initial schedule, the mass production will start in June. However, due to the coronavirus pandemic, the company can no longer follow the initial schedule. Mass production only takes six months, thus, it can start in the second half of the year.
Nevertheless, because it will be one of the few companies mass-producing the 5nm process, it will still bring a huge return to TSMC. The expectation is that it will bring in 10% of TSMC’s annual revenue. TSMC’s revenue last year hit $33 billion and this year it could increase by 14-19%. Thus, TSMC’s 5nm process could contribute about $4 billion.
When we compare the 7nm (first generation of the DUV ) with the 5nm process, there is a significant increase. The 5nm chip provides 1.8 times the logic density, a 15% increase in speed and a 30% reduction in power consumption.
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Huawei Kirin 1020 & Apple A14 will use TSMC 5nm process
The manufacturers on top TSMC’s 5nm chips are Huawei and Apple. We will have Apple A14 and Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 1020. The Apple A14 is reported to reach a frequency of 3.1GHz.
As for the Kirin 1020, the specific specifications have not been confirmed. Previous rumors said it was upgraded to the Cortex-A77 architecture, but there are also rumors that Huawei will skip the A77 generation and go directly to the future Cortex-A78 architecture. There are speculations that Kirin 1020 will offer a 50% performance increase. This makes it most likely that Huawei will skip the A77 architecture because this architecture alone cannot achieve such a high-performance increase. What can be confirmed at present is that the Kirin 1020 will be released with the Mate 40 series in the second half of the year.
