Following reports that Apple plans to shift away from Samsung for chip production, concerns over a chief rival’s CPU production capacity have been raised by a new report at Digitimes. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company may start producing chips for Apple’s next iOS devices as soon as next year, according to “industry observers,” but it’s unclear if the company will be able to provide proper capacity for Apple’s massive and growing needs given its existing contracts.
TSMC still serves other major clients, such as Altera, Qualcomm, and Nvidia, so the company will be challenged to keep up production for those companies while taking on Apple’s massive production demands; it may also see profits decline due to tight Apple margins. A previous report noted TSMC would use 28nm and 20nm process technologies to produce CPUs for Apple; the new report notes that TSMC plans to open a new 20nm factory in Taiwan, increasing its production capacity.
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