A new report states that Samsung is about to abandon 3nm chip production to focus on 2nm. The manufacturer hopes to launch the marketing of these from 2025 and clearly does not want to fall behind TSMC, its great rival which is already deploying its 3 nm chips on the market.
A year ago, Samsung embarked on the 3nm race. The manufacturer was the first on the market to succeed in manufacturing a chip engraved with this process, ahead of Mediatek and TSMC. Obviously, it didn’t take long for the latter to announce that it had also launched its own production. In fact, it was even the fastest, since it was the first to manufacture a 3nm chip for smartphones. This probably tells you something: the A17 chip in the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max benefits from this process.
Currently, the A17 chip manufactured by TSMC is therefore the only one sold on the market. The Exynos 2400, which Samsung has just revealed to the general public, will in fact be engraved in 4 nm. The same goes for the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. In other words, Samsung, and for the moment all Android smartphones, are slightly behind the Taiwanese manufacturer and the Apple brand. And it might last for a while longer, according to a recent report.
Samsung would be on the verge of abandoning the 3nm chip
According to Korean media, Samsung could indeed decide to abandon the marketing of its 3nm chip. The manufacturer would thus be falling too far behind its rival, which would push it to already embark on the next stage: the chip engraved in 2 nm. Objective, to respect the deadline imposed by the firm with marketing from 2025. Note that TSMC also plans to launch its own 2 nm chip the same year.
On the same subject — iPhone 15: Apple plans a big commercial success thanks to the A17 Bionic chip engraved in 3 nm
It is likely that the reason which pushed Samsung to make this decision is the very poor performance of its 3nm production line. For the moment, only 60% of the chips leaving the factories are usable, far from what is necessary to supply the company’s customers. Note that the performance obtained by TSMC is similar, which will quickly pose a problem if the manufacturer starts supplying manufacturers other than Apple.
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